Into Each Other's Falling
by whereelse
Summary: John is nothing if not competent, thriving when he is needed. He resents it. After Sherlock's death he falls back into the depression Sherlock saved him from after Afghanistan. Then Sherlock returns amid dead torturers and John's clinical depression and the only real communication Sherlock seems to be able to have is of the very physical kind.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

It's been seven months. Long enough for the sharpest pangs of mourning to pass and to start feeling again, enjoy the birds chirping, the sun's fist watery smile of spring, all the things of cheesy romance novels, but there is none of that. True, the strong stabs to his throat and digestive area have lessened, but instead it now feels like his throat is always constricted, grown smaller in mourning like it has become a narrow straw through which enough air flows for him to continue breathing, but not enough for anything else.

After the first week he allowed himself to cry a fair amount of times, but that urge had since left him and now he is back into the familiar world that feels like a blanket, a thick smothering woollen blanket, that makes it dark, but not really, not enough, and makes it so difficult to breath, polluting the air with tiny bits of fabric entering him with each breath, slowly clogging his airway until he is sure that the only mode of survival left to him will be to sit on the sofa and wait for it all to end.

John feels sure if the situation would have been reversed, Sherlock would have been braver. At the very least he would have taken a proactive stance towards suffering, if not actually putting a bullet through his brains or shooting lethal amount of drugs in his system, he would at the very least be hunting, punishing, torturing.

His own position is far less courageous. When his therapist, his sister, Mycroft even, whoever, had mentioned it would be good to start working again, he had done so only a few days later. Where Sherlock would at least have the decency to starve himself, he ate three meals a day, and not even really unhealthy ones at that. Even going to the pub with some old rugby mates, he had stopped after four pints, his cowardice preventing him from truly getting smashed. Almost fondly, he remembers a straight-faced Sherlock asking him to roll up the sleeve of his jumper, brandishing around a hypodermic needle with a clear fluid, stating that if John were so adamant to get drunk, he had a much faster and more pleasant way, not involving mindless chatter over too loud music and the smell of stale beer and a participant from a hen party breathing in his ear. John had shaken his head, sighing and smiling.

That was the worst of it. That even the memories of when they had been alive and laughing or fighting or silent, but alive, that they didn't evoke feeling anymore, like they were now forever darkened, not by his death, but by John's own inability to feel.

John stops walking and mechanically checks his surroundings. The house number he is standing in front of is 412, which means he has overshot by more than a hundred. Annoyed with himself for letting this happen again, he turns around and quickening his pace, he retraces his steps, this time only reading the numbers, murmuring then, saying them out loud, anything to keep his thoughts out of his own brain. When he reaches number 304, his breathing has become strained and shallow, and he resolves to pick up his running tomorrow, because he is far from fit right now, his resolve is followed immediately by a constricting feeling of disappointment in himself, right around his throat. Sherlock would have stopped moving altogether.

"Hello love", the receptionist greets him, although she is too young and he too old to be addressed like that still. "Would you mind taking a seat. Dr. Aggins started with his next patient, rather than wait, so it'll be a minute." He can see the kind disapproval behind her glasses. This hasn't been the first time he is late.

When Dr. Aggins finally lets him in, he doesn't waste time on pleasantries with John, rather pointing him to his chair and asking how he is feeling, before he even sits down.

John pauses and considers lying, instead the truth escapes him, before he catches himself.  
"The same, I'm afraid."

"So no improvements noticed?"

John shakes his head.

"How are you getting on with the side-effects?"

"None to speak of."

"Right." Dr. Aggins adjusts himself in his seat. "Well, as you are surely aware of we would have expected to see some changes by now. We have already adjusted dosage, so I think it's time we started trying another SSRI in the family, what do you think?"

John just nods. Sherlock would have said the -pam family would be rather more effective. Diazepam would be his first choice. Sherlock would have deduced something painful about the man sitting opposite of him, instead of going along with an idea he doubted had any merit to it. John just nods. When his therapist had suggested that he see his GP and consider going back on medication he'd just nodded. He doesn't think they would notice him shaking his head, as accustomed as they are to his just nodding. He doubts he would notice himself.

Five minutes later he is standing outside with a new prescription and withdrawal and build-up scheme for his flashy new antidepressant and the familiar feeling of having failed.

He is already standing in front of the pharmacy before he realises it is actually a detour to take on his way home. But prescriptions need to be filled and he feels he is nothing if not competent. Literally.

Two weeks ago, Harry had called. John had been sitting on the sofa, trying to keep breathing, but when hearing her slurred speech, he had had no problem getting up, getting dressed, getting her. Home, four hours later he had resumed his place on the sofa, trying to keep breathing.

So this what was it was going to be then. He had already done this after Afghanistan, and he would continue to do so, of that he had no doubt. Sherlock had merely been a brief respite from his depression. Someone who needed him enough to make him competent for two years, before he became superfluous again. And depressed. He and his therapist had discussed this at length of course and he is, whatever Sherlock say, smart enough to recognise the pattern of being needed and taking care and then falling and falling and falling.

"Oomph", he hears escaping from someone's mouth and then is reminded that he did feel someone bump into him. "Oh sorry, oh hey, hi John."

Turning he realises it's Mike Stamford that bumped into him. Although upon reflection it seems likelier that is was the other way around.

"Good to see you again. You alright?" He looks a bit uncomfortable, like it might be the wrong way to enquire after someone's emotional state after a death. Which it probably is.

"You look better than last time we met. Good to see you holding up." Mike looks even more uncomfortable now and it takes at least six more seconds for John to realise it's probably because he hasn't said anything so far.

"Hey Mike. Good to see you. Yeah, so listen, I got to run, but let's grab a pint soon, shall we?", which he feels is maybe overshooting it a bit familiarity wise but it seems to be working as Mike smiles relieved and pats John on the arm.

"Let's, John. Glad to see you're doing better." And all John can think when he walks away is how bloody competent he is, even in bloody pretending he is.

This thought sustains him on the walk home, which is far too long and his feet are killing him and he feels so old and that is good. That is a good feeling.

Finally he reaches Baker Street and puts his key in the lock. Just when it clicks open he hears loud sounds coming from above. Without thinking he starts to run up the stairs, but before reaching halfway he hears what is unmistakably a gunshot.

His heart jumps and out of custom he checks his weapon which of course is absent, but still he runs and before he knows it he is stupidly pushing open the door of 221b. What he sees makes his brain and his body doubt each other. First he notices a man, lying on the floor, which stupidly causes him to wonder what a man would be doing lying on his floor, before he takes in the blood and the gunshot from before and the man standing over the body on the floor. A man in a long overcoat, grinning.

John recognises the funny disconnect between mouth and thought when he hears himself speaking.

"What the bloody hell are you doing here, Sherlock?"


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Unfazed Sherlock looks up from the only barely dead man lying at his feet.

"You look awful", he states as though those are the obvious words to say to someone when you've just risen from the dead.

John is slightly taken aback, but only slightly. His anger is returning so quickly and overwhelmingly that he feels tears behind his eyes.

"What the bloody hell are you doing here?", he repeats, this time spitting the words across the room. When Sherlock just stands there, standing still, blood spreading in the carpet, he follows it up with a stupid: "I look fine"

Sherlock keeps standing there looking at him and after way too long a time in which John's blood is alternating between boiling and chilling, Sherlock just shrugs "No you don't", and returns his gaze to the corpse, his look changing to one akin to seeing a particularly challenging word in Sunday's crossword. That is, if he were Mrs. Hudson.

"I look fine", John reiterates, the overwhelming urge to cry having subsided somewhat, leaving more room for the boiling in lieu of the chilling.

Sherlock sighs and gives him a look normally reserved by normal children for petulant children.

"You haven't been eating properly, your personal hygiene is severely lacking, your limb hard returned and with it your therapist, you have a drinking problem and you are resorting to pharmaceutically enhanced emotions. Of course you look awful. Now what can be do about this?", returning to Mrs. Hudson's crossword at his feet.

John is both too enraged and amazed to decide on any action based on either one of those emotions. Finally his mouth settles on, "That's not…"

"Of course it is. You've only used one plate and a fork for months. Dust on all the rest in the cupboards. You wouldn't classify that as proper eating, you…"

"Why were you looking through the cupboards?" John interrupts, as though that is in any way the relevant question to be asking.

"Alibi", Sherlock shrugs while finally turning towards John before continuing. "You shaved this morning, but your skin is raw, meaning either longer hairs, no shaving cream or an old blade, probably all three." He start walking towards John. "You shaved specifically this morning, meaning you meant someone to see it. Someone who would take it as a sign of you being fine, so your therapist." He is now standing right in front of John, who sputters: "That doesn't mean my personal hygiene is lacking."

Sherlock's mouth twists into a half-smile. "No, but this does." He stretches out arm and softly lets his hand touch below John's jaw, under his ear. The skin feels coarse under his hand with the hairs that he's missed and hot.

It takes a moment for John to remember that it's not his skin that is hot but his anger. He pushes Sherlock's hand away with more force than is necessary.

"Fine", he spits, but Sherlock is already continuing with his vivisection. Postmortem, John's mind supplies unhelpfully.

"Your drinking problem, yes, that is interesting. A bottle of Scotch on the table, a used glass next to it."

"I don't have a drinking problem."

Sherlock continues like John is irrelevant, which infuriates him further. "Of course you do. A used glass, but no lip prints on it and only a bottom of clear fluid. Clearly not Scotch, water then, but you wouldn't poor yourself a bottom of water and you didn't drink from it, so melted ice. The Scotch is dusty on the top, but not on the sides. Handled many times, but not opened once." He pauses looking John in the eye for the first time.

"You got a glass with ice and a bottle of Scotch and watched the ice meld without drinking anything. Why not? If you were confident it would be one glass, you would have drunk it, so you weren't confident, ergo a drinking problem."

"That's not a drinking problem, Sherlock. In fact that is the opposite of a drinking problem." Through his anger, John vaguely notices how whiny he sounds.

"It's a problem related to drinking. It's a drinking problem." Sherlock actually smirks. "You should've drunk it too, sleep would have helped, I antidepressants are easy", nodding at the plastic Boots bag still in my hand. "New prescription though there was a full box lying in the bathroom. That means they weren't working." He catches himself and take one more step forward. "You didn't shave for your therapist, you shaved for your doctor."

"That doesn't mean I look awful", John whispers and suddenly he realises he has no clue why he is defending himself against Sherlock, who is standing too close to him, Sherlock who is trying to overwhelm him, and suddenly all that white and hot anger comes back to him in such strong waves he can't suppress them any longer.

Coolly he steps aside and his voice is perfectly even when he speaks. "Get out of my house. Now."

Sherlock's mouth is open and quiet. A genuine look of surprise coming over his face.

"You heard me. Get out."

Sherlock mouths closes and opens again, less quiet this time. "I doubt you want me to leave without clearing up the mess." He points behind towards the man and the bloodstain.

"I'll take care of it", John says and points a steady hand towards the door opening in front of which Sherlock is now standing. "Get out."

And then with a huff, Sherlock leaves.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

His anger leaves with him and without feeling John gets his phone from his pocket and dials Lestrade's number. They exchange limited words, strained from Lestrade's side about months ago, devoid of any emotion on John's. When Lestrade hangs up, John steps out of the open door and walks downstairs to let the police officers in. Only when he reaches the bottom step and pockets his phone, he notices his hand's tremor. Slowly he sits down on the bottom step, his breathing shallowing and gaining speed. He puts his head between his knees and stays like that, until the doorbell rings.

The officers swarm in and take over Baker Street and John has the inkling it should be a familiar sight by now, but it's not. It seems to take place in a world far removed from his own, where all sound is muffled and his vision strangely centred. It is a world that has so little to do with John, with who he is, what he is feeling, that the chasm between him and those people in his house seems to be widening by the second. He only hears Lestrade's voice after he feels his hand on his shoulder.

"You alright, John? You look a bit shaken."

John shakes his head, to shake off he doesn't know what, and then changes it into a nod when he realises what it is that Lestrade is asking.

"Yeah, yeah, alright," he mumbles and then belatedly realising that Lestrade is still holding his shoulder, he smiles "I'm fine, just a bit shaken about the dead man in my sitting room, I guess."

Lestrade seems satisfied enough with that and grimly looks at the dead man. "Right. You do know I'll have to take you to the Yard for questioning."

But John's mind is already detaching itself from reality again. He mutters sure, sure but stays where he is and it is Lestrade hand on his shoulder once more that pushes him, this time leaving him leaving the world, just guiding him, out of this house that doesn't make sense anymore.

It is two-and-a-half hours later when John is handed his coat. Two-and-a-half hours of playing John, who doesn't know anything, who is a bit shocked by the dead man in his sitting room, who is more than willing to help the police, and yes of course he will share everything he knows. Two-and-a-half hours of looking at himself playing John and more and more forgetting who that person is, what he is doing here and what he has done before.

"Where are you staying?", Lestrade is asking. And John feels like finally someone is throwing a rope across the chasm.

"Obviously we can't allow you back into Baker Street just yet, though tomorrow is probably fine." It is not a robe, John thinks, but his brain can't come up with any other metaphors and Lestrade is looking uncomfortable again at his silence. "We need your address, so we know where we can reach you."

John realises he has nowhere to go and that it is ironic that he probably would have called Lestrade if the situation was in any way different. He summons playacting John again. "My sister's, " and he gives him the address.

He vaguely hears Lestrade "I'll be in touch" behind him when the glass sliding doors open to let him out.

He knows he has no intention of going to Harry's tonight, because going there would mean talking and talking would mean being John and he knows he can't be John now. So he walks, and walking is good, because anyone could walk, especially anyone without a house, or a home or a future beyond the next three streetlights he passes. Walking is good, because his leg hurts and his fingers and throat hurt from the cold and his throat hurts, because that's what it does now. And his body doesn't act, it just is, unlike his brain, which is an untrustworthy, unreliable, betraying, lying sack of shit, that deserts him whenever he feels like it and he wants nothing to do with it.

In the end, when his leg and his fingers and his throat won't walk any more, he enters a pub and joins the few other man that sit there by themselves with their luke-warm pints. So John sits with his lager and focuses only on the feeling of liquid entering his throat, trying to follow it through his oesophagus into his stomach, hoping to catch it entering his body and poisoning his brain, but when he loses the swig, he takes another.

By his third pint the pub is full, the solitary men no longer visible in their loneliness, now masked by much younger, much happier frequenters, and John vaguely remembers a John who would have been comfortable in that crowd, enjoying a night out with his mates.

The gulps of his fourth pint are bigger and his fifth makes him slightly nauseous and makes his eyes unable to focus in a very satisfying manner. When an inebriated woman joins his table and starts chatting him up, it doesn't even take so much effort to summon acting John, who flirts and flirts and leaves with her to her place where they have clumsy sex, that doesn't lead to orgasm for either one of them, and John vaguely thinks how fortunate it is that she is drunk to, before falling asleep.

He wakes the next morning to the sound of a text message, which makes his heart grow cold and his head go warm, until he checks it and sees it is only Lestrade, texting him that his house is fair game again. His brain scolds his body for reacting so severely, but they don't discuss why. The anonymous shape next to him is still sleeping deeply, so John gets dressed, which doesn't take much work as most clothes never even came off during the night. His head is pounding, making it difficult to think, which is rather perfect. He leaves her sleeping without saying goodbye or leaving a note, and when he steps out of the front door, he realises he has no clue in which part of London he is. His mouth is parched and he wishes he had thought to use her bathroom before sneaking out, but walking is now the only recourse, so that's what he does, his body protesting wholeheartedly.

After some time he realises cabs are passing him, so he hails one and hears himself mentioning Baker Street to the cabbie. He wandered further than he remembers from the precious night, because it takes a good ten minutes to reach a familiar area. His hands start tingling, when he starts recognising the streets around Baker Street and for the first time in over twelve hours he allows his brain and body to communicate with each other. 'I'm nervous', they tell each other.

The cab drives off and it seems to John as though the acting version of himself is driving off with it. He feels in his pockets for his house keys to open the door. His right hand is steady when putting the key into the lock, but his left is shaking ever so little when it pulls of a small remnant of crime scene tape from the door frame.

When he walks up the stairs, he strains his ears for any sound out of the ordinary. When only quiet reaches his ears, he feels an unexpected and overwhelming wave of emotion flooding over him, that his brain refuses to recognise for the disappointment that it is. When he opens the door, the apartment is empty and cold. John takes one look and turns around, back down the staircase, back outside, back to the cold, back in time. He walks.

His hangover has now changed into tired eyelids, tired shoulders, tired feet, a whole body humming with tiredness, but it seems to only fire up his brain, until it can no longer be ignored. John quickens his pace, to block out the thoughts about the thought he doesn't want to entertain, he can't entertain, not possibly, not rationally, not emotionally. It is a non-thought, in its likelihood, and its relevance and its existence, but for something unexacting it is annoyingly persistent. Finally he gives up the fight with his brain as a bad job and turns around to return to that cold and empty apartment so his brain can win in quiet and think all the things it can't, and it shouldn't, and it wants.

This time however he hears the violin, before he has even opened the door. Eighteen months with, no, the last years have taught him that it is Bartok he is hearing and that thought is enough to for his brain to flood his body with neurotransmitters and emotions. The time that he was explaining how Bartok was altogether disappointing for his inability to stand firmly behind his atheism, how for one agonisingly long night all he played was the beginning of 'The Miraculous Mandarin' over and over again, until John has asked, no ordered him to finish it, for the love of God just finish it, because John had known asking him to stop playing altogether would be futile, and his face, filled with disgust over the emotional investment John had in seeing it finished, detesting the emotions of the opera, even though John had only realised that much later, when he knew who Bartok was, and which opera it had been.

Every step on the stairs floods him with these forgotten memories of him. Him organising John's collection of tea bags, because it had upset his sensibilities of order that John organised his teas regardless of history, and topography by throwing together Ceylon and Earl grey and god forbid Rooibos, with his drawling posh voice, scorning John for not knowing who Earl Grey was and how the story of the tea's naming is wrong, because obviously bergamot oil was not used in tea in 18th century China. And when John opens his front door, his brain is firing off so many disconnected stories, that he vaguely thinks that this must be what it is like to slip into a psychosis, because today (last night? yesterday?) he separated brain and body, John and john, and now brain and body and John and john have come back with a vengeance.

Come back. Finally his occipital lobe registers what his eyes have seen seconds before, and it suddenly comes to him so brilliantly clear. And he finally lets himself think the impossible fact: Sherlock has come back from the dead.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Sherlock is standing by the window with his back towards John, playing his violin with excruciating control. John's brain is suddenly suspiciously silent, only listening, only receiving input, without offering up anything of its own. So he just looks at Sherlock, with his coat still on, with his left hand straining when it manipulates the strings to change the intonation, his right arm moving the bow in a disjointed rhythm, his cheek pressing on the chinrest. And it takes the longest time before his brain knows what to do with this information, before it knows what it means, really truly.

"You're alive."

Sherlock misses a note by maybe a quarter tone and that is the only recognition John gets. Slowly he starts across the room, his footsteps silent on the carpet - like Sherlock wouldn't know him moving anyhow - but his body is now drumming with this thought: alive, alive, alive, alive, alive and he wouldn't want to make any sound to disturb that. So he stands right behind Sherlock, seemingly playing the crescendo with exaggerating motions , the show-off, and then just grabs his right arm, stopping the music near-instantly on a deformed note, and he pulls Sherlock into an embrace.

After some seconds John feels Sherlock awkwardly wrapping his arms around his shoulders, bow and violin still in his hands.

"You're alive," John repeats and Sherlock just hums his agreement and this lack of contesting makes John look up at his face, which seems tense but also so very familiar and he tries to meet Sherlock's eyes. Instead Sherlock kisses his forehead, which seems so out of sync with the man he knows and yet is really all John wants of him right now, because it means he is human and he is alive. But Sherlock is already tightening his muscles and pulling away, so this reassurance is all too brief.

"I see you went ahead and proved me wrong about your drinking problem," Sherlock says with a half-smile and a crinkled nose, and this reminds John's body and brain once more that they reside in the same place and that this place is in front of Sherlock, who went ahead and smelled last night and went ahead and died. Apparently the only thing his brain and body agree on is anger.

He stays quiet though, waiting for Sherlock, because that is what he does and it truly is Sherlock's turn. He looks uncomfortable with this silence and makes an attempt to lounge into a superfluous explanation of his deductions that John silences with raised eyebrows and an angry set mouth, because really, he can smell the sweat and alcohol and cigarettes and perfume on himself well enough.

"What did you tell Lestrade?", Sherlock tries.

"The truth."

Sherlock raises an eyebrow.

"I told him I came home and found a dead man."

Sherlock left eye twitches in a way that might actually be mistaken for wincing. When he realises there is nothing more forthcoming from John, he resumes his look of detached uncomfortableness. John purposefully stays quiet, knowing fully well that they are standing very close, facing each other, with Sherlock avoiding his eyes and that it is making Sherlock very uncomfortable. John can feel the anger from yesterday growing inside him. His body is so tired and doesn't fight well against emotion at the moment. But Sherlock takes a step back and puts violin and bow in its case, which takes him altogether too long.

"So nothing, Sherlock?"

He stills, and closes the lid. Finally he turns around and sits on the couch, facing John, but still not quite meeting his eyes, which is pulling John in all the wrong ways.

"I think I might have missed you," Sherlock says, so quiet it could be whispering.

John huffs. "You think you might have missed me. That's great Sherlock, just splendid. You come back here, without explanation, without a word, after I buried you months ago, to tell me you think you might have missed me."

Sherlock just sits there.

"I thought you were dead, Sherlock, dead. As is gone, never to see again. I grieved for you. I mourned you. And now you come back and tell me you might have missed me. That is just bloody fantastic."

Sherlock is looking at John with a blank face, that is too taut. "I don't understand what you want from me John. I had to do it. It was the only possible solution. Surely even you must understand that."

John flinches in spite of himself. "The only possible solution. Really? The only solution for what exactly? You couldn't have given me a hint you were alive, surely you're smart enough to make that part of your bloody solution."

Sherlock is still sitting unnaturally stiff. "It would have been a liability."

John's mouth is just closing and opening on its own now. He is so angry with that man, who is sitting there, breathing there, everything John wanted him to do, but it's all wrong. He can't reach him. Maybe his brain had atrophied so much in the last months under the strain of dangerously little serotonin receptors that he can't manage the basic act of making himself understood anymore. So great, there goes competence.

"I can't make you see, can I? A liability you say. Who gives a bloody damn about liabilities? I thought you were dead, Sherlock." He is so angry, his muscles are cramping and he feels his nose prickling, so he tries with all his might to not cry, to please not cry. It infuriates him to no end that Sherlock is still sitting there, quiet, calm and he is again the one out of control, grasping for it, but not able to get it. Struggling to regain his composure, his competence. Not able to truly let it go either. He is not crying and not calm. Failing at both, unlike Sherlock.

"And that is what kept you safe," Sherlock points out softly.

Through the pain in his chest and the cramps in his arms and the veil of anger over his vision, John is vaguely aware that his cheeks are now getting wet.

"Maybe I didn't want to be kept safe. Did you ever consider that? I don't want to be kept safe. I don't want to be kept, period. That was not your fucking choice to make, you arsehole. I didn't want to be kept safe."

Sherlock suddenly stands up, coming up close to John, raising himself to his full height, intimidating him.

"I wanted to keep you safe," he hisses.

John rolls his eyes so far back they hurt, more. "That's what it's all about then. About what you wanted. What about what I wanted? Or am I kept like a pet, without feelings. What did you think would happen. That I would whine like a dog lying next to the bleeding front door, waiting for your return, until I would forget. What, Sherlock, what did you think would happen?"

Sherlock is angry now, so angry that his face is showing it.  
"He was going to kill you," he snarls. "He had a professional sniper aiming at your head. Surely you would prefer living, than ending with a bullet in your brain. You always seemed inordinately fond of it."

Suddenly John feels like he can't yell anymore, because nothing is penetrating that thick skull in front of him. The one that he saw cracked and bleeding on the pavement every night since it happened. He is vaguely aware he is still crying, which is just so unfair because Sherlock is now the one towering over him, all righteous anger and he is the one incapable of getting his message across. They should be in the polar opposite position.

"Fuck you, Sherlock. I was inordinately fond of yours," he whispers and his hands half push, half pull, are on the collar of Sherlock's coat. Then his body takes over again, bypassing his brain completely, and his hands are only pulling and Sherlock's mouth is on his, which is strange and unexpected and not at all what he intended to do. But his mouth responds, rough, and his tongue enters Sherlock's mouth and is enthusiastically greeted by another tongue. His brain is screaming with anger at Sherlock, while his hands are pulling him closer and with detached shock he notices his own erection. Sherlock seems to notice it too and his hands, which up to now were hanging stupidly by his sides are cupping John through his jeans and grabbing his arse, which is both confusing and painfully arousing.

Sherlock starts rubbing him through the fabric and his body leans into the touch, but he doesn't want to, he doesn't want this. Sherlock relentlessly continues though and John feels his body hurling toward its release. His last thought before coming is that it feels like Sherlock is trying to drag all of his anger out of him. Then he comes horribly, deliciously, painfully in his trousers. He feels Sherlock's mouth leaving his, while his body is still spasming, and slowly more sensory input reaches his brain. He is wet: his mouth, his pants and he is tired: his whole body. He pushes past Sherlock with more force than necessary to let himself fall on the couch. Sherlock stands there, strangely flushed, and then abruptly walks across the sitting room and opens the door to his room, his room, and John hears the door slam shut, but doesn't see it, because his eyes are closed and his brain is halfway off to sleep.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

He wakes up to the faltering light and it takes some time for him to decide between morning and evening. His hangover is mostly gone, but his whole body is sore from lying on the sofa and his trousers feel itchy with dried semen. He checks his phone for the time, and is immediately confronted with 5.20pm and nine missed calls, five of which are from Sarah, which he realises with a start means he missed the whole of his shift at the clinic. The other four are from Greg. He erases the log in his phone.

Laboriously he gets up and walks to the bathroom. The flat is quiet and it makes him restless, but he wants to be selfish and shower, not care about Sherlock and where he might be and what he might be up to. Turning up the heat so that the whole room steams up and his vision is clouded, he slowly undresses, dragging his jumper over his head, feeling the wool on his neck, concentrating hard on each button of his shirt, the buckle of his belt, not his trousers or pants, but his shoes and socks. A terrorist planted IEDs in his brain, so care is warranted.

He steps under the shower, the hot water hurting. The smell of mostly cigarettes dislodges itself from his skin. The pain of too hot numbs his thoughts, but not his body, which is humming with a low level of arousal. He soaps himself up, but his skin is adjusting to the temperature too quickly and it's conjuring images of a bleeding man on his floor and of the interrogation room of the Yard, of the anonymous bed he slept in, and of Sherlock standing by the window, Sherlock touching him. He tries turning up the heat but it won't go further.

He washes his hair perfunctory and then steps out of the shower to quickly dry himself off. He forgot to get fresh clothes from his room, so he ascends the stairs wrapped in only a towel. He feels exposed in a way it shouldn't.

He dresses and decides to deal. First the phone calls. He rings Sarah and explains about the dead man in his flat. Halfway through his explanation, he chuckles out loud when he realises this is the first time he missed work after Sherlock fell, (jumped). His timing is awkward as his story had reached the point of a man bleeding out on his floor, but he covers by comradely noting the absurdity of random people dying in your flat. Sarah seems to understand and softly chuckles with him. She asks if he can resume work again tomorrow and he says sure, fine and only when hanging up the phone he realises that entails leaving his flat and all it contains for a full day.

Next is Lestrade. John apologises weakly for not returning his calls sooner, truthfully stating that he slept through the day, worn out by shock. Funny how lately truth and lies seem to intermingle and sometimes merge completely. Lestrade wants to question him again. Some questions surrounding the identity of the burglar have come up, and John understands that to mean: no simple burglar, background check too blank, must have something to do with him, but Lestrade is too careful to say. They arrange a meeting early morning, which means John has to call Sarah again to tell her he can't work after all. They decide it's better to not schedule him for a week, or until this is all over, and John refuses to recognise the relief in his own voice. Sarah seems to sense something though, because she asks, voiced with ample sincerity, if he is alright, but really John, are you really alright? John hums and fine, fines, just the shock, through his answer, knowing he sounds sincere enough for Sarah to want to believe it, knowing its his experience from months of answering these questions that have made him so competent at it.

When they hang up, John hears Sherlock behind him.

"You should tell Lestrade you suspect Mycroft might have something to do with it. He is much better equipped to deal with the fallout than you."

"Right," John says stiffly and gets up to go to the kitchen and see about some dinner.

After putting the kettle on to boil some water for pasta, he asks: "Who was he anyway?"

Sherlock had followed him to the kitchen, hovering near the table.

"Slavoj Abramovic, Serbian, specialises in torture of the unpleasant variety."

Despite himself John chuckles. "I wasn't aware there was another kind."

He busies himself with the water and the pasta again.

"What was he doing here?", he asks after having made abundantly sure the food is boiling. Of course it means, what are you doing here, John knows they both know it.

Sherlock rolls his eyes. "I would think that to be obvious."

"But why me?", and it means why now, after.

"It seems there have been rumours that those of my death were somewhat exaggerated. He was sent to make sure."

By torturing it out of you, is how that sentence is supposed to end.

"Right." John unceremoniously drops a jar of tomato sauce in a sauce pan. "Bit of a miscalculation on their side then."

He turns around the face Sherlock just in time to see the hint of hurt leaving his face.

"Right."

For the next five minutes he just stirs in the pan, quite superfluous but he is determined not to let on how acutely aware he is of Sherlock's continued presence in the kitchen. When the pasta seems remotely edible, he drains it and dumps big scoops of it on two plates, adding the lukewarm bolognese. He shoves one plate towards Sherlock and follows it with a fork, which falls off the table on the other side. Sherlock, to his credit, picks it up and starts using it immediately.

When both their plates are half-empty, he is ready to ask his next question. "Why Mycroft?"

He sees on Sherlock face how he is calculating all the different meanings of that question and their outcomes. John even thinks he can see on Sherlock's face how he settles on the most cowardly option.

"You know how he hates dealing with these trivial matters, it will be good for his health to run down Scotland Yard a few times."

"Right."

He doesn't ask why did Mycroft know and I didn't, because of course. He doesn't ask why didn't you let Mycroft deal with the torturing murderer in our flat from the start, because he isn't sure whether he should say our flat, or my flat. So he says nothing and just finishes his plate. When he's done, he drops his empty plate and fork in the sink.

"Wash up when you're done, will you?", he says, just to see what will happen and Sherlock actually starts towards the sink and it takes two steps for him to change his mind.

"Wouldn't dream of encroaching on your area of expertise, John." He drops his plate (half full) in the sink, leaves his dirty fork on the table and swirls past John out of the kitchen.

John is left with two pans, two plates, a fork and a mixture of relief, anger and overwhelming sadness, with a hint of something resembling arousal.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

The next morning John leaves his room with only enough time to make toast and put jam on it. Sherlock is lying on the sofa. John contemplates just ignoring him for a second but decides on "Goodbye," while rushing out the door, so he is unable to hear any response, should that be forthcoming.

He has only just started walking towards the tube station when he notices the black car slowly following him. He hasn't spoken to Mycroft apart from one ill-fated meeting where he had suggested that John pick up the pieces of his life, for some sentiment similar to 'he would've wanted it', during which John had walked out without even punching him, and even worse, had listened and returned to work the following week. He had regretted it ever since.

He ignores the car for the first few yards, but when he needs to cross the street, the traffic light is red, so he is forced to stop right in front of it. The rear door swings open and he decides ignoring it is unlikely to be a successful strategy.

"I have a meeting, you know," he mumbles to 'Anthea', after settling in the back seat. She just smiles, without looking up from her Blackberry.

They drive in complete silence for at least ten minutes, in which John tries to remember all the turns the car takes, because it occupies his mind and is better than the alternative thoughts that are queuing up. Six left turns and five right ones later - including eight traffic lights - they turn in to a parking garage and the driver takes them up to the top floor, another twelve right turns. Mycroft is already there, absurdly sitting on a chair in the middle of a completely empty parking deck in the dead centre of London on a weekday. John decides he really doesn't want to know how.

"Dr. Watson, please sit," Mycroft tells him in his absurdly formal manner upon John exiting the car.

He doesn't. Childish perhaps, but John feels he is entitled to some childish behaviour right now. If Mycroft anticipated that, he doesn't let on.

"What do you want, Mycroft? I have a meeting." Childish is as good as any conversation form at the moment.

"Yes, so I hear, with the fine gentleman from Scotland Yard. What did my dear brother propose you tell them?"

John is still taken aback by the nonplussed manner in which Mycroft is admitting to a whole range of things that should have left him crawling in shame. For some reason he expects Mycroft to be the sensible one. So he just stares and tries to convey this emotion. Mycroft is unimpressed.

"Tut tut, Dr. Watson. I am merely minding what could become my business very quickly, were you to heed to what was undoubtedly my brother's injudicious advice. But I trust a practical and competent man such as yourself concurs with me that we shouldn't overcomplicate this…spot...we find ourselves in." Mycroft vaguely waves his umbrella around.

John is unsure if it's the alluding to his perceived competence or the euphemism for your brother returning from the dead that does it, but before he knows it, his right fist connects to Mycroft's left cheek in a satisfyingly painful manner. Mycroft's chair falls back with the force of his blow, and suddenly three oversized men (where did they come from? the parking deck was empty, wasn't it?) pull him back, without minding his bad shoulder in the least. Mycroft get up and quickly regains his composure, although John is pleased to see his hand start towards his face, before he thinks better of it. With the smallest nod of his head, he signals the men to let him go.

"I see you are still a tad emotional. I am sure Sherlock's precipitous return is wearing on you. We will continue our conversation at a later time."  
Mycroft turns around, where Anthea, whose eyes have been on her phone throughout the entire altercation, takes her hand of it long enough to open the door of the car for Mycroft. She gets in after him and they drive off without haste. When John looks around the three men are gone as well and he is left standing next to two empty chairs, one of which is stupidly lying on the floor. He gives it an extra kick for good measure, when he feels his phone buzzing.

-I hope you didn't share our plans with my dear brother. SH-

He kicks the chair one more time, and then turns towards the exit, hoping he is not too far away from his destination. He receives two more text messages walking down the six floors.

-By which I mean I hope you didn't let him provoke you into admitting it was indeed our plan. SH-

Every few steps are interspersed with more buzzing.

-Or at the very minimum blackmailed him for a considerable sum. SH-

-Cash of course. SH-

-As a promise of money is worth very little, when you don't intend keep the promise of not holding to your end of the blackmail. SH-

-Which I'm sure you understand. SH-

-You didn't get any money, did you? SH-

-John? SH-

He receives the last text when he steps out of the parking garage, which is apparently conveniently located opposite to the Yard. Which in turn makes John wish he had hit Mycroft twice.

He switches off his phone completely and enters the Yard. He finds Lestrade exactly two minutes before their intended meeting time. They shake hands and he asks John to follow him to an interrogation room, that is a tad too formal for his liking. But when Lestrade gestures for him to sit down, John abides.

"How are you, John? Getting over the initial shock?" he asks, and the dubious tone of his voice is barely disguised. John thinks: You know your life is messed up when a Detective Inspector of Scotland Yard knows for a fact that it takes more than a man being shot dead in your flat to shock you, but is hesitant to use that knowledge in an interrogation. He says: "Yes, yes. It was all rather upsetting."

As a response, Lestrade leans back slightly in his chair clearly signalling his resignation to play this game. John feels a stab of sympathy for the man on the receiving end of secrecy.

"It seems our simple burglar who came to his untimely demise in your flat, is a simply outstanding participant in Serbian society. There was no indication whatsoever that he has ever attempted something like burglary before or any other criminal act, come to it. Nor have we been able to determine what he was doing in the UK at the time of his death. Doesn't that strike you as odd?"

"He must be good at his profession." John keeps his expression blank and slightly bored, although he doesn't have to fake the latter.

"I have to warn you John, you are the first and foremost suspect in this case, it being your flat and all."

"But?"

"The Met approaches murder investigation with care."

"So you haven't arrested me out of…icare/i?"

"Well, the absence of gunpowder residue on your hands is unusual."

"I could've washed it off."

"And you called me."

"It could have been panic." At that, Lestrade looks so incredulous, John can barely keep a smile off his face.

"Mr. Abramovic appears to have been shot with a Webley-Fosbery Automatic Revolver. Such an old and classic piece of weaponry seems a bit at odds with a modern military man such as yourself."

John can just imagine Sherlock chasing dangerous snipers with a very early 20th century automatic handgun with the story to match. It would add exactly the type of flair to a crime that he would admire himself. He can't stop the grin from taking over his face this time. It seems to surprise Lestrade and make him a bit more daring.

"If this had happened a year ago, I would have had to make an arrest by now." He looks so uncertain, as though merely referencing Sherlock's existence is going to make John fall and never stop falling. John himself is slightly surprised that nothing of that sort happens and this is perhaps what makes him give Lestrade something.

"You mean this has Holmes written all over it?"

"Well, yes."

"Did you know Sherlocks has a brother in the British government?"

It is clear from the look on Lestrade's face that he has in fact considered this option. "You mean, Mycroft? Yes, we have met." He seems to lose himself in thought. "He doesn't seem like the type to get personally involved in things."

"People can get a bit unusual when it comes to family matters." John answers him. Nudges him really.

"Perhaps." Lestrade says, still hesitant, but with a finality that means he knows it's the best direction he has to go in. "I'll need you to stay available."

"Naturally."

Lestrade gets up and John follows his cue. He holds the door open for John to pass and hesitantly says: "I'm sorry you have to deal with this alone" and John appreciates the sentiment, he does, but the only reaction to it seems to be his brain suddenly shouting with all its power - as limited as it is, he hears Sherlock add - 'not alone'.

Once he exists the Yard, he switches his phone back on. One text.

-Bring Indian. SH-


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

John returns with copious amounts of Indian food, only to find that Sherlock is still lying on the sofa in his robe, clicking his tongue, presumably trying to figure out how it is that a torturer-for-hire was sent to retrieve information having to do with him at Baker Street, or perhaps how he can make this wholly Mycroft's problem. His presence is taking up the entire room and John finds it difficult to position himself. He sets the food on the coffee table and makes for the kitchen to retrieve some cutlery. Sherlock doesn't look up, but when John returns he finds him actually drinking the mutter masala straight from the container. He finishes his food before John has even settled down and without a word of gratitude retreats into his thinking pose.

John spends his lunch trying not to look at Sherlock and after thoroughly cleaning the unused kitchen, he goes to Tesco to stock up on ingredients he hasn't even considered in seven months. It takes up the better part of the afternoon. Once he is home again he is forced to realise it was a decidedly bad idea to not go to work this week, because home now means Sherlock again and he has no idea whatsoever how to be around him. He can't seem to stop his eyes from wandering to Sherlock and he can't stand it because Sherlock looks so horribly inormal/i, which is everything he shouldn't be after returning from the dead. John also finds that Sherlock's head invokes in him the dual desire to check his skull for where it should be cracked and bashing it in himself. But when he moves his gaze to Sherlock's hands which are pressed with the palms together, fingers touching his mouth, it is not much better, as he remembers checking and not finding a pulse and also Sherlock's hands on him, touching him.

In the end he settles on looking at his novel, so he can see all of the Sherlock-shape in his peripheral vision and nothing of the words that are printed on the paper in his central view.

"Stop shifting," Sherlock admonishes him after ten minutes. So John gets up and goes into the kitchen for his fourth cup of tea. After he tries watching telly, but Sherlock finds the noise distracting, yet refuses to leave the sitting room. When it nears dinner time, he tries cooking more elaborately than he has done in months - probably years - with all his newly acquired foodstuffs, but Sherlock finds the smells and sounds distracting and maintains he will refuse to eat any of it anyway, because of the Indian he consumed for lunch - was forced to consume, John knows he means. He finishes only about a fifth of the dinner and barely tastes it. Then he is once more sitting in the chair opposite of the sofa Sherlock is occupying. He gives reading another go, but Sherlock finds fault with his book and non-existent reading speed. Next he considers all the questions he could ask Sherlock, mostly how he has done it, but just thinking about it makes his blood boil and he doesn't dare go there again.

He retreats to his room far too early and comes down at least twelve times to alternately refill his cup and use the loo. Sherlock doesn't move the whole evening. At some point, John decided to try sleeping, but lying down, lights out, that seems like such a distant option he doesn't try for more than ten minutes.

It annoys him to no end that they have spend countless hours in companionable silence and that it is now impossible to be in the same room without feeling the need to leave or talk or something, because there are just too many damned feelings hanging in the air. Especially as it seems to be solely him that is suffering this. When he goes down for the last time it is 2.35 in the morning and Sherlock is still lying there, eyes now closed, seemingly sleeping. John gets a duvet from Sherlock's bedroom and covers him with it. He settles back into the chair and allows himself to look.

When he wakes up, he realises he must have fallen asleep as well, because well, he woke up, and he is stiff and cold. The duvet he used to cover Sherlock with is lying abandoned on the sofa. He feels the smallest pang of disappointment, although what was he expecting really, it is Sherlock after all. Judging by the light it must still be very early. For a minute he contemplates moving to his bed, but despite the heaviness of his body, he is no longer sleepy. Instead he retreats to the kitchen to put the kettle for another cup and while waiting for the water to boil, he uses the loo. When he returns, Sherlock has once more resumed his position on the sofa, looking very much awake.

Suddenly he hates him for not sleeping, not enough. Because a sleeping Sherlock is the only John can stand to look at, without feeling so bloody angry, so terrifyingly happy and just so plain istupid/i that he can't function anymore.

He finishes preparing his tea as fast as possible and then takes it with him into the bathroom, turning on the shower. The anger is vibrating inside him, burning him, together with his scalding tea and then the hot water, which runs out within minutes before he has a chance to finish washing his hair. Sherlock's hair; it was wet, and that is a deduction even he should have been able to make, a failing no doubt Sherlock will poke fun at. If they were speaking.

He finishes rinsing his hair under the fast cooling stream. Perfunctory he gets dressed, feeling the lack of sleep stinging behind his eyes. It is still very early and he has a whole empty day ahead of him filled to the brim with a Sherlock he doesn't know what to do with.

Returning to the sitting room, John once more regrets agreeing to a week off and more out of habit than necessity gets the hoover and starts tidying. It is satisfyingly distracting to erase his traces of the last few days, although he can't help noticing his tendency to leave Sherlock's traces intact, nor is he able to completely ignore the fact he is avoiding the general direction of the sofa with his roommate sprawled onto it. He hoovers so thoroughly to avoid the thought that comes with that designation of Sherlock, that he starts sweating slightly from the effort. All in all it is a fairly successful coping strategy until he comes across an inconspicuous plastic bag next to the door that he opens without thinking. It holds the unopened box of his new SSRI that he has completely and totally forgotten about until this moment.

The hoover is still going and his breath is gone for a bit, while his head gets lighter and he leans against the wall and then sits down for a bit to put his head between his legs and he knows all through the panic attack that he would take this over the constricted breathing and the suffocating numbness every day, which makes it both better and worse.

When he regains a basic level of functioning, he looks up to see Sherlock staring at him. It infuriates him.

"I don't know who you are anymore," he tells the grey eyes staring at him.

John can see this throws Sherlock and it takes him a good eight seconds more than usual to respond.

"Of course you do, I'm exactly the same as I was."

John closes his eyes at this and sighs. "The Sherlock I knew wouldn't be. After."

He pushes himself up and turns off the hoover. The quiet is oppressing.

He starts winding the cable back into the machine, to give himself some time to think through the strange mix of emotions coursing through him. He identifies it as anger. Mostly.

"You've only existed in my head for the past seven months, Sherlock. I don't know how to get you out of it again," he says very quietly, because that is loud enough in this room now, where each sound is a disturbance of an unknown balance and who knows what will happen when it is upset.

He picks up the hoover and feels a drop of water falling on his hand. Damn his suddenly returning emotions. Without facing Sherlock he drags the thing towards the cupboard.

"Housekeeping and antidepressants make you a into a competent '50s housewife, John. Exchange beer and Scotch for gin or perhaps sherry and the drunk women for the gardener and you can probably pass for your mother," Sherlock says in an oddly controlled voice. Or maybe that is just how he speaks and John's mind has remembered it more kindly. John pushes the cupboard door shut and turns around to face Sherlock, who has started walking up to him. He feels his control slipping irretrievably.

"Fuck you. You have no right to see me like that, to read me, to see me falling, when I couldn't jump. You jumped."

"I jumped for you John. I jumped to protect you," he says, so calm, so collected.

John just glares at him for a good many seconds.

Then he spits at Sherlock: "You fell for the thrill of the chase, the cleverness of pulling it off, I was a convenient excuse." His hand is shaking, he can feel it. "Stop making me into the reason for it all and be a bloody man and call it for what it is. You jumped for yourself."

And Sherlock is just standing there, helpless, totally in control, completely obliviously in the know. John hates him. Or what he did. John isn't sure of anything anymore. So few things are clear. He tries taking his time to catch his breath, but the pause only serves to anger him further, especially with Sherlock so unresponding.

"You know what, Sherlock, I am not so stupid that I do not know it still makes you a fucking better man than me, because I wouldn't jump, I couldn't, I could only fall and never catch myself."

He is breathing heavy with anger, standing a mere foot from that composed person that he knows and he doesn't and he just wants to take apart and make whole again.

Tentatively, if that is a word that John could ever apply to him, Sherlock reaches out a hand to put on his arm and John thinks it is the icare/i with which Sherlock does it, that makes him push him so hard. Because the only thing that could make this worse is Sherlock treating him with the calculated insincerity that he would apply to a witness in one of his cases. So he pushes, so hard that Sherlock falls back on the floor, and suddenly there is nothing of the previous composure left on his face. It is contorted and wild, while he scrambles to his feet and storms at John, pushing him into the cupboard door, the handle painfully pushed into his back, making his body double and his brain only capable of focusing on his left lower quadrant. This must be why he misses the next bit, because suddenly Sherlock has John's belt undone and is shoving down his trousers and pants and then it is Sherlock sinking down to his knees and taking him into his mouth. He is so hard and completely unsure when and how that happened, and also incapable of sparing that a thought, because Sherlock is sucking him, hard.

John groans loudly as Sherlock starts moving his mouth up and down his cock and alternately licking the head. His hands find their way into Sherlock's hair to gain control of the situation, but Sherlock only takes him in deeper as a response. His fingers curl and pull on the hair and under his hands he feels Sherlock head moving back and forth on him, around him, against him, and it is just so fucking wrong and so fucking good.

"Sherlock..stop," he manages to get out, but his hands are pushing Sherlock's head further down on his cock and he hears himself moan loudly when teeth scrape his penis. Sherlock hands have moved to his arse and are dragging them closer together, setting up a rhythm for John to fuck Sherlock's face. For a few short moments, John tries to keep it controlled, but the sensation that is overtaking his body is so good, that it is useless and soon he finds himself moving in earnest. He feels Sherlock humming, in what could be a moan, and it vibrates inside him. Sherlock's hand, no longer occupied with dictating the pace moves between the cheeks of his arse and without preparation John feels one finger pushing inside him and he only manages "Sh…", before he starts coming down Sherlock's throat. He feels Sherlock swallowing, while his body spasms. When it subsided John tries to move his hands out of Sherlock's hair towards his body, to drag him up, to kiss him maybe, to hate him maybe, but Sherlock won't let himself be pulled up by the little force left in John's arms. Instead he pulls back, letting go of John's diminishing penis, and swipes his mouth with his sleeve. He doesn't look at John, just gets up and leaves him standing there, trousers at his knees, having just come the hardest he can remember ever having come.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

It takes some moments for the rush of arousal to settle and his breath to even out and the now so familiar drum of anger to return. But the anger is getting more mixed with shame and want and guilt and relief and desperation and the odd sensation of being more alone than he has been in a long time. It is that last thought that makes him pull his trousers up and go knock on Sherlock's door, because if anything he can't stand the thought of feeling alone when Sherlock is there, like he felt alone with everyone he met with after returning from Afghanistan, like even in Afghanistan he felt it, being the doctor and not the soldier like the rest of them, or before in medical school, not the doctor and not yet the soldier, with a need that placed him outside, despite being so damn competent at fitting in. Alone like with Harry, but that is not somewhere he wants to go anymore.  
"Sherlock!"

Nothing.

"Sherlock, open the bloody door."

Nothing.

"Sherlock, don't make me fucking break down this door. I swear to God, I will do it and hit you over the head with the pieces."

A huff. Threatening might not be the way to go, especially when John is just bluffing and Sherlock knows it.

"Sherlock…just open it. We need to talk." Different tactics.

Quiet.

"Fine. Have it your way." He gets his coat and slams the door shut behind him. With intent he walks to the nearest street corner and stands in front of the CCTV that slowly rotates in his direction.

"I know you can see me, Mycroft. I need to talk to you," John tells the camera.

The CCTV moves away from him again. John picks up an empty cigarette carton from the floor and tosses it in its general direction. Misses of course. He kicks the bricks below it for good measure and starts walking. A woman is staring with a fascinated look on her face, like she has never seen a schizophrenic with hallucinations before.

He gets to Hyde Park before a black car catches up with him. He gets in and is surprised to find Mycroft himself in the back seat, with no sign of 'Anthea'.

"Vandalising government property is not the way to convince me of your improved emotional status. Nor is stopping taking your medication, for that matter," Mycroft says in his ever polite voice.

John is not in the mood for Mycroft's games. "Why did he return?" he asks evenly.

"You know I'm not privy to Sherlock's deliberations."

"Like hell you are." John sighs. "Fine. Why do you think he returned?"

Mycroft stares out of the window for a bit. "Did Sherlock ever tell the story of how he met Detective Inspector Lestrade?"

He hadn't of course and Mycroft knew that of course, so John doesn't grace him with an answer. Mycroft continues regardless.

"There was a drug bust in a warehouse in Ilford. Hundred-and-twenty pounds of cocaine, street value of 5.6 million pound sterling, and six dead bodies. That is when the detective inspector was called in. It was only when the coroner came that they realised there were only five dead. Sherlock spend three days in a coma and solved the mystery of the murders within five minutes of waking up." There is a hint of pride in Mycroft's voice that John hasn't heard before.

"Why are you telling me this?" he asks.

But Mycroft continues unperturbed. "It was after Sherlock collapsed on a scene, and vomited all over the body almost a year later, that the detective inspector arrested him. After a night spent incarcerated, he was banned from crime scenes by Mr. Lestrade were he to display any signs of being under the influence. It took another six months for Sherlock to comprehend that the detective inspector meant it. He has always maintained his recreational drug use was purely for scientific purposes, never to soothe the demand of his own body."

John shakes his head. "I don't need to know this. This is not your story to tell."

"You think my dear brother will share?" Mycroft raises his eyebrows in a mimicry of disbelief.

"Then just answer my bloody question, Mycroft. Did he mean to return? Or was it the unfortunate Serbian?" John has spent enough time with the Holmes brothers to not miss the tightening of Mycroft's eyelids. "He didn't, did he? Did he even mean for me to find him that night? Or was I supposed to come back to a corpse." Again a twitch of his left eyelid, who knew Mycroft had a tell. "Oh, right, stupid me, I was supposed to come back to an empty apartment, never to know something had happened there."

Mycroft starts staring out of the window again.

"Dr. Watson, what transpired was not in accordance with the plan, I will give you that, but we now have to deal with the actuality of the situation. Either way, Sherlock is back at Baker Street and is stuck there until such time that the general public knows of his continued subsistence."

"Existence..", though John can't help but smile at the joke.

"Existence. The annunciation of which I would rather have happen in a controlled manner."

"You mean use it to draw out whoever it is that send that bloke to my flat."

"I have considered that."

"I or we?"

Mycroft sighs deeply. "I. Sherlock is quite opposed to the idea, though I wouldn't put it past him to reject it just for the sake of being contrary."

Well, neither would John. He hadn't even considered that as far as the world is concerned Sherlock is still a fraud who killed himself out of guilt over his deception. He hadn't considered much of anything apart from how it was to have Sherlock back in the sitting room, back in his bedroom, back near him, the Serbian only being a passing thought as something that needed to be dealt with, an inconvenience really. He certainly hadn't considered Sherlock's continued presence at their flat being out of necessity.

"Do we need his permission?" he asks.

Now Mycroft look at him, surprised, which is always quite a feat with him. "It would certainly make things easier, but I wouldn't call it an absolute necessity, no."

"So what do we do?"

Of course he gets no reply. The car falls quiet. It is a few minutes later when Mycroft finally speaks again. "Your stop, Dr. Watson."

"What?" John had been so absorbed in his thoughts, he hadn't noticed the familiar  
houses of Baker Street. "Right." He makes to get out, knowing Mycroft well enough that there is no sense in trying to get something out of him now. When he stands on the pavement he pokes his head back into the car.

"I don't trust you, " he tells him.

"I know," says Mycroft with a smile that appears genuine.

John smiles back for the shortest instant and then slams the door shut. The car drives off immediately. John turns and checks his pockets for his keys, knowing while doing it exactly where they are laying on the kitchen table. He rings the doorbell, and it takes some time for a disheveled looking Mrs. Hudson to open it.

"Sorry dear, I was having a nap. Did you forget your keys? I didn't realise you had left, there was an awful racket before, when I was trying to sleep, but I must have dozed for quite a bit, because here you are."

John shift uncomfortably. "Just stepped out for a bit. To get some ehm...groceries. But forgot my wallet and keys, silly me. Sorry about the noise, Mrs. Hudson. I was just cleaning and ehm…"

"Of course, of course, don't worry about it dear. You be off then," and with that Mrs. Hudson dawdles back to her sitting room.

John skips every other step to find the flat in an exceedingly bad state of dishevel. For a short moment his right hand moves to get his unfortunately absent gun, before he realises neither a burglar nor a murderer would focus his energy on systematically tossing books and papers from one side of the flat into the kitchen on the other side. Sherlock is of course nowhere to be seen. When John aggressively tries the door handle of Sherlock's bedroom, assuming it to be locked, he all but falls inside the (surprisingly neat) space. He calls out, hoping Sherlock wouldn't be stupid enough to leave now, but there is no reply. He takes a neatly placed book from the bookshelf and tosses it against cabinet filled with 19th century medical curiosa, which fail to fall to the ground. So he kicks it.

Just to be sure, he checks the bathroom, but it is empty as well. Suddenly he hears a soft creak upstairs, from the same room as where he stupidly left his gun this morning. Softly John makes his way up the stairs, though he forgets to skips the seventh step and it croaks loudly. He stops and listens, but there is no sound coming from above either way, so he continues upwards. Before he can doubt about what to do after reaching his, he hears a distinctly Sherlocky cough coming from the other side.

John sighs heavily and admonishes himself for not recognising the obvious. He moves the door handle, but the door has been locked with his barely used key, that was in a jar full of household knickknacks, John would have sworn Sherlock didn't know the existence of. John had never bothered with the key himself. Half a day of Sherlock had been enough to realise it would take more than an indoor lock to stop him, and it had taken John a day at most to see that Sherlock's morality didn't involve the concept of privacy.

"Sherlock, I know you're in there. I don't know why, but just open the door and we can talk," John tells the wood in front of him softly.

John hears Sherlock move around but gets no reply.

"Do you seriously expect me to have this conversation with a door in between us," he asks.

This merits an answer. "I fail to see how wood has any bearing on the contents of any conversation."

John rolls his eyes, despite the fact no one can see him. "Well, I don't really require you to see how it has bearing, for me to mind."

Nothing.

"Fine, have it your way." John noisily sits down on the floor. "I spoke with Mycroft."

The sound Sherlock makes sounds suspiciously like 'stupid git'.

"He told me the story of how you and Lestrade met."

"It does require a rather grotesque nose like Mycroft's to stick it where it doesn't belong. How was his diet?"

"You'd be pleased. Have you spoken with him since you - " John decides to bite the bullet, "returned?"

"No."

"And before?"

"We had a row once or twice."

John decides to switch tactics from flank attack to frontal.

"Why did you return?"

"Didn't Mycroft tell you?"

"He seemed more interested in telling stories of your past than answering my questions. You're not either, by the way."

"Well, it must be obvious even to you that I came back to stop Mr. Abramovic."

John begins to lose his patience. "That's not why I mean, Sherlock, and you know it. Why now? Why come back?"

No answer.

John bangs his fist against the door in frustration. "Sherlock, damn it, I have a right to know. Just bloody answer me." When it remains quiet, John has a very slow and dreadful realisation that he was right. "You didn't mean to, did you? I wasn't supposed to come home and find you."

He hears Sherlock shift and chooses to interpret it as uncomfortable.

"I was supposed to come home and find the flat exactly as I'd left it. What went wrong?"

After a pause, Sherlock says: "He wasn't supposed to be in 221b at all, he was staying in the flat opposite. When I saw him enter, I didn't think it through, I just followed."

John feels his throat constricting in disappointment and bile. He hadn't realised how he had counted on the fact that if Sherlock had done it for him, he had also returned for him. It seemed saving someone's life and sharing it are two very different realities.

"So was I ever to know you were still alive? Were you ever planning on coming back?" John asks.

"Why does it matter?" Sherlock replies.

"It just does. It matters to me, because I…I don't know. Because I just care."

"You shouldn't." Sherlock says evenly.

"You can't decide that for me, Sherlock. To have or not to have certain emotions. That's not something that is in your control." John is getting impatient again.

Sherlock mumbles something like: "It should be", although it could have been "It could be," John isn't quite sure which.

"You still haven't answered my question, " he says.

"Nope, " Sherlock just says.

John groans in frustration. "Is that an answer to the first question or the latter?"

"The latter was a statement, not a question."

"Sherlock…" The itching of his hands makes him realise he has had enough of these childish word games of avoidance, so he gets up. "This is going nowhere. I'm leaving." But he doesn't even make it to the stairs before the door flies open and two hands drag him into his bedroom.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

"You're not leaving," Sherlock states imperiously, and he closes the door behind John and locks it. John considers his options for the briefest moment before lunging for the key that Sherlock now holds in his right hand. Sherlock quickly shifts it to his left and John tries reaching around his back to grab it, but Sherlock is too quick and is now dangling it far from his and John's body. John pushes, hard, so that Sherlock stumbles against the cabinet with an oomph sound and the dull thud of several books falling to the ground.

"Just give me the damn key," John pants, but Sherlock just reiterates "You're not leaving," though he sounds a tad less sure of himself this time around.

In response John's right hand grabs Sherlocks' left fist and pushes him back against the cabinet again, trying to get his arm down, but Sherlock suddenly lets his arm give, throwing John off balance. Sherlock uses John's unevenness to turn them around and push John against the bare wall. Sherlock's right hand is grabbing John's left, just as John's right is grabbing Sherlock's left in a disturbing equilibrium. Sherlock is using the whole of his body weight to pin John in place, and he is too tall to fight.

So John stamps down on Sherlock's foot. Hard. This makes him double over, and John quickly pins his arms behind his back and starts trying to pry the key loose from Sherlock's clenched fist, prying open his fingers one by one. John barely has it in his hands, when Sherlock pushes his whole body back against John, which makes him topple over. Sherlock makes use of the opportunity and fixes John on the floor in a hold down that wouldn't embarrass an Olympic judoka. Now it is John who has a key in a fist and has nowhere to move, though the floor is less advantageous as a strategic position than the wall had been for Sherlock. He tries wriggling, but there is no give.

"Sherlock, let me go," he says with a calm stern military voice, though he doesn't feel quite that calm, because he has just become aware of an erection starting to form in his pants and that interferes with his sternness. Still, Sherlock's grip loosens just a little, just enough for John to gain some manoeuvrability though this only results in him looking Sherlock straight in the face for the first time since that morning. A morning which seems to have happened in strange synchronicity to this now, with them fighting, with Sherlock against him, Sherlock's mouth on him and before John is aware he lifts his head towards Sherlock's, who responds with the immediacy of a falcon spotting a field mouse. Their mouths crush together and Sherlock's tongue immediately pushes into John's mouth and swirls around John's tongue, their teeth clattering raucously. When Sherlock bites his lips and then starts sucking on them, John feels his hips bucking against Sherlock's where he can feel a faint trace of an erection. Despite his arousal, there is still a part of John's brain that feels this is incongruous and suddenly his higher functions take over again.

"Sherlock, stop," he tries, but it is hard to speak when someone's mouth is trying to ieat/i yours and even more when it feels so good your own mouth joins in. His hands are unavailing as Sherlock is still pushing his arms down with all his might and squirming feels too good to really make a point. It is only when Sherlock's mouth is leaving his mouth in favour of biting the skin below his ear that he finally manages to say something in an intelligible manner.

"Sherlock, I don't want this. I want to talk about this," but he knows as he feels Sherlock's mouth closing over his again that he is lying, because he does want this rather badly actually, although he has no idea why or how or why really.

So he is kissing Sherlock, and pushing his tongue into Sherlock's mouth and alternating that with sucking. Their stubbled chins are rasping together in a way that John can't even bloody articulate as to how much it arouses him, his hand no longer struggling to get free, but instead to get out, so he can pull Sherlock closer, touch him, undress him, anything and everything at the same time. Sherlock seems to read it differently though, pushing his hands harder down on John's arms, so that his knuckles are scraped by the wooden floor. Sherlock stops trying to suck John's tongue into his mouth and pulls back a bit. John's head lifts to try and follow him.

"Fuck me, and you can leave," Sherlock tells him before John can continue kissing. It must be the crudeness of the words that does it, because it can't be the content - a blind monk would have seen where this was going - but John feels himself splitting once more into acting and observing, and he can isee/i himself saying "Fuck, yes." He observes Sherlock letting go of his arms rather abruptly so that he has his hands free to undo his trousers. And he sees his own hands mimicking Sherlock, and when Sherlocks trousers are down and John's are as well, barely below his arse, but enough for Sherlock to grab him, that is when he only does and feels and any hint of unbiased observation is gone.

Sherlock is moving his hand up and down John's cock so fast it is between hurt and good and John tries to do the same to Sherlock, but his pants are still in the way and Sherlock quickly moves down John's body to prevent John from touching. Or perhaps it was to enable him to take John's cock into his mouth and suck hard on it. John groans loudly. Sherlock pushes down his underpants with his mouth still on him. His tongue is circling John's head fast and it doesn't feel good, it feels frustrating and fucking arousing, but not good, no, so it's a relief when Sherlock's mouth leaves him. He looks at Sherlock, naked from the waist down, trousers around his ankles shoes on, face red and wet, cock full. John pushes himself up to kiss Sherlock again, but Sherlock pulls back and John follows, so that they are both on their knees facing each other and then John viciously grabs Sherlock, before he can pull back even more and shoves their mouths together. Sherlock's tongue finds it way back between John's lips and John is almost biting down on it to keep it there, when Sherlock pulls back again.

"You always keep your promises, don't you?", he asks in a voice John would have recognised as too uneven to be secure had his brain been anywhere in the room with him.

He nods awkwardly and in response Sherlock brutally grabs his hair and when his mouth is close enough, he bites down on John's lower lip enough to draw some blood. He licks it and then orders: "So fuck me, John."

He pulls John down on him and somehow manages to divest himself of the clothes pooling around his ankles in the process. He starts licking his fingers and vaguely John remembers something needing to be done that was never that much of a necessity with women. He starts looking around haphazardly for some kind of lubricant, but Sherlock grabs his chin and turn John's face back on his. "No, " he says.

John should argue, he really should, but Sherlock wet fingers are underneath his body and moving while his other hand is still forcefully holding John's face and John sees Sherlock eyes and they are off, they are pleading and forceful and angry and scared and exactly like John imagined them to be right before he jumped off that fucking rooftop of St. Bart's.

Sherlock's hand is finished with his arse, and is pulling at John's cock, not guiding but putting him in place and Sherlock's knees are one either side of John. John feels himself pressing against Sherlock's body, a contact more visceral than any before. His hesitation is cut off because Sherlock's hand is back in his hair and they are kissing again and Sherlock's hips lift so that John pops in. It is very tight and coarse and the distraction of kissing is very welcome, because John refuses to start pounding into Sherlock like he wants to. Sherlock, prick that he is, senses this and stops kissing and now all John feels is his cock buried inside Sherlock and Sherlock's cock, fully hard, pressing against his belly. His hips move of their own volition and he pushes even deeper inside, burying him inside Sherlock, burying Sherlock. His mind returns to the room because of stupid word association and he suddenly needs to pull away from this unwanted intimacy. But Sherlock has his hands of John's arse, holding him firmly in place.

"You are angry, " he states. "Show me." He pulls John by the arse, purposefully digging his fingernails into John's skin, while looking defiantly into John's eyes.

John listens and starts pounding into Sherlock, with every stroke showing Sherlock how bloody angry he is at him for leaving, how furious he is for Sherlock returning like this, how everything at everything, because he needs Sherlock. You were exactly what I needed. Push. Fuck, that is hurtful. Push. And embarrassing. Push. To admit. Push.

John realises he is speaking when he sees how utterly terrified Sherlock is looking, but he can't stop now and anyway Sherlock's fingers are still trying to draw blood out of his arse cheeks.

"I need you, Sherlock." Push. "Bloody you." Push. "Who is quite" Push. "possibly" Push. "the most" Push. "obnoxious" Push. "insensitive" Push. "bastard" Push. "that ever" Push. "walked" Push. "the earth." Then he is just pounding for release from his anger and arousal, but Sherlock has turned his head away and is refusing to look at him. So John borrows his move and grips his face to turn it back. When Sherlock's eyes, dilated, darker, scared with surrender, meet his, he abruptly comes deep inside Sherlock's body, spasm after spasm, because every time he pushes one last time, Sherlock's eyes do a shift between gratification and fear, that touches John deep inside his belly and makes him push once more and come more.

When he is finally done his arms give out and he collapses on top of him, his shirt and jumper uncomfortably warm and uncomfortably limiting the feeling of another body against his. He is panting hard and cannot seem to open his eyes, but the motions of a competent lover are so ingrained in him that he doesn't need to make any conscious effort for his hand to move in between them to feel for Sherlock, while he slowly pulls out. He hears Sherlock's ever so soft moan of pain and feels Sherlock's softening penis in between them and he realises this is not good at all.

"Are you alright?" John asks cautiously, though being sticky and half-naked and lying on him detracts somewhat from the caution.

"Naturally, " comes the answer too fast, but he doesn't push John off.

John still thinks it's prudent to get off of Sherlock himself. He has just pushed himself upright, awkward and calm at the same time, when suddenly he hears a piercing scream, he immediately recognises as Mrs. Hudson's.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Sherlock and John both tense and then look at each other for confirmation for the shortest second before they are pulling up trousers and John is in search of his gun. Sherlock can't get his shoes on, because he didn't untie his laces to get them off, so he gives up and races to the bedroom door, which is of course still locked.

"John! The key!"

John has his gun in his hand and is loading it. He had forgotten about the stupid key.

He looks around haphazardly and then tells Sherlock "I don't know, I must have dropped it. Just force the damn door."

"I can't. I put in an extra secure lock to prevent just such a thing. Just find me the key!" He looks a bit sheepish, saying it.

John drops to the floor to search, while Sherlock impatiently waits for him and starts shouting directions at John, while uselessly jiggling the door handle to show John to get on with it.

"For fuck's sake you stupid git, get down here and help me."John tells him.

They both hear the dull thud of something heavy hitting the floor. Sherlock drops down on his belly and crawls under the bed. John blindly feels under the cabinet. Suddenly he spots the key in the corner below bathrobe. He scrambles to get it and hurriedly opens the door with gun loaded in his hand, while Sherlock is wriggling out from under the bed. He is already halfway down the stairs before he hears footsteps behind him. He hears Mrs. Hudson scream again and stops dead at their front door. Sherlock bumps into him, which makes John's heart jump high into his throat.

"One man, around 14 stone, likely armed with a handgun and a reserve as well as a knife of sorts as a backup. Professional, knows hand-to-hand combat. Not that quick though and he has an injury on his right leg, probably severed a tendon once, that's his weak spot, " Sherlock whispers behind John's back.

John nods and quietly moves down the stairs, until he has a clear overview of the situation. The intruder is half-hidden by the kitchen door, and it seems he is holding Mrs. Hudson by the throat. The close body contact rules out a direct shot. He knows he missed the creaking step when the man turns in his direction. Quickly John presses his back against the wall, but whether he is too late or the man decides to investigate regardless, he hears footsteps coming towards the front door in a slow slightly uneven gait, mixed with the terrified little footsteps of Mrs. Hudson. John looks up, where there is no sign of Sherlock, so he makes a quick decision. He pushes himself off of the wall to gain momentum and lunges himself against the intruder, adjusting slightly to avoid squarely hitting Mrs. Hudson. The man automatically aims his gun and shoots, but misses, because John's attack is a bent one, low to the ground, familiar to all those who play rugby, and the bullet flies a good 8 inches over him. John's shoulder makes heavy contact with the man's upper legs and it pushes him off balance. He lets go of Mrs. Hudson and his gun to break his fall.

While they are collapsing to the floor, John shouts for Mrs. Hudson to run. His opponent uses the time to reach for his boot. John unorthodoxly tries to prevent him from getting his reserve gun by squeezing the man's calf. It works; the man roughly kicks his leg to make John let go and the gun falls out off the shaft. Unfortunately when jerking his leg, his attacker also knees John full in the face and he hears a crunching sound. Combat training makes him kick the gun away, while automatically reaching for his face. His hand is wet after touching his nose.

Then he becomes aware of something sharp against his throat. The man hisses: "Get up," and John scrambles to his feet. He feels the blood from his nose dripping off his chin and on the hunting knife Sherlock so accurately predicted, which is pressing into his Adam's apple. The force against his throat is a precise balance between threat and delay, likely to be upset adversely by John stamping down on the man's foot, or kicking back against his shins. So he holds still, aiming to become as unthreatening as old ladies in their nighties. But then the pressure is gone, and all 14 stones of the man fall back from John. He looks up and sees Sherlock standing in the hallway, with smugness in his entire posture. John steps away and turns to find his assailant clutching his right side around John's favourite bread knife.

"You had to use that one, didn't you, " he admonishes Sherlock with relief.

Sherlock tosses him handcuffs rather similar to those used by the Yard in general and Lestrade in particular, that John uses to cuff the man to the stove. Before he can prevent it, Sherlock is gripping the bread knife with enthusiasm.

"Who send you?" he demands.

The man just moans in reply. Sherlock makes to twist the knife and John quickly grabs his arm. He nods at Sherlock that it's okay and Sherlock, surprisingly, backs off.

John then turns his attention back to his assailant. "You are going to bleed out, which judging by the localisation of the wound will take roughly two to three hours. I would say that is a rather painful way to go. Now either you tell us what we want to do and I take care of this for you, or we go watch Eastenders upstairs at a volume loud enough so we don't have to hear your moans. It's up to you."

John ifeels/i Sherlock looking pleased behind him and kicks him against the shins.

"So, which is it going to be?" John says in the friendly conversational he generally reserves for 62-year-old patients with persistent belly aches.

The man doesn't get a chance to answer though, because Mrs. Hudson walks in and shrieks: "Oh John, what has he done to your face?" and starts collecting napkins to stop the bleeding. She comes to a abrupt halt midway between the door and the drawer she was aiming for. She half-turns to look at Sherlock and then slumps to the ground.

Sherlock moves just in time to catch her before she hits the floor. John leaves the man to take care of Mrs. Hudson, giving Sherlock a look that he hopes says: see what happens when you pretend dead. Sherlock, perhaps in reply, draws a checkered - and neatly pressed - handkerchief from his back pocket and hands it to John. He looks at it confused, before he realises he is bleeding on Mrs. Hudson's apron. He presses it against his bloody nose and with his other hand softly shakes Mrs. Hudson's shoulder. It takes only a few moments before she comes to with unfocused eyes directed at John. They flutter close and when they reopen they are determined.

She slaps Sherlock across the face hard.

She sits up. "How could you? What you have done to poor John. That is inexcusable behaviour, Sherlock, letting us all believe you had gone on, most of all poor John. He couldn't even return to the flat for weeks and all his stuff was here too. Hardly took any drawers with him, barely surviving. And he was so angry with you. Every right he had too. Oh Sherlock!" and then she puts her arms around Sherlock and draws him into a very tight embrace, while sobbing on Sherlock's shoulder. Sherlock looks totally unsure of what his reaction should be and just lets her. When after some time he decides to extract himself by sort of handing her to John, she adds: "And now, another burglar in the house. I don't know what this area is coming to. But don't you worry, I've called that lovely fellow at the Met and they are on their way. Dear me, all this. Oh Sherlock!" and she starts sobbing again on John's shoulder.

John and Sherlock look at each other at the same time and have a silent discussion using only their eyebrows. John's raise saying: not another body. Sherlock's raise while he looks up at John: not what you're thinking of. John's squeeze together: do you have a better idea? Sherlock's head falls back and his shoulders slump: fine. He then fishes a phone from his one of pockets and John hears him saying: "This is not a social call, Mycroft, " before walking off.

John peels the still sobbing Mrs. Hudson off of him, with the promise of a cup of tea and turns his attention to their captive who is groaning in pain.

"I can take this out now and stop the bleeding. Then you talk, or I swear to God, I will leave Sherlock alone here with you while I make Mrs. Hudson's tea, " John says.

The man can barely nod at this point.

"Sherlock! " John yells into the hallway, "Get my emergency kit, will you? And put the kettle on, while you're at it."

John gets up to rummage through Mrs. Hudson's drawers in search of a pair of scissors. Immediately Mrs. Hudson gets up to help him, though her hands are shaking so bad, she drops the scissors right upon finding them. John picks them up and steers Mrs. Hudson to the hallway, where they meet a panting Sherlock, who hands John his kit. John entrusts Mrs. Hudson's to Sherlock's tender care, who puts an arm around here and keeps muttering "A nice cuppa" to her.

John starts cutting open the man's shirt and removes it carefully. He lays out the materials he expects to use with rhythmic precision, getting his mind ready for the complete focus of emergency surgery. Each metal instrument is familiar like dusty sandstorms and the sound of gunfire in the distance, their order determined through dying boys amidst severed limps, observed through detached eyes. He knows he relies on Sherlock as his ears and eyes, like army life taught him to blindly rely on his backup, so his senses are freed for only those medical movements.

He cleans his hands with disinfectant and lays open two sterile gloves. He prepares the area around his bread knife with iodine on cotton, taking care that the tweezers don't bump into the knife. He puts on his left glove and spreads his fingers around the entry wound. With his right hand he starts pulling the knife out very slowly, watching the man's complexion for any signs of oncoming hypovolemic shock. John admires the amazing pain tolerance of the guy as he is still conscious and watching him as he works. When the knife finally comes out, John notes with relief that blood is oozing from the wound steadily, making any arterial damage unlikely. Spleen injuries can still bleed like hell internally though. He puts away the knife and put on his other glove. Just when he is ready to examine the wound, two hands on his shoulders pull him away and his place is taken by what is presumably a doctor, in a fine tailored suit, just visible under the scrubs he's wearing.

He draws himself out of his flow of concentration. Sherlock is leaning against the wall next to the door, arms crossed, looking thoroughly unhappy with the way things are going. Behind Sherlock he hears a familiar voice.

"Look lad, you're damn right I'm questioning your jurisdiction. I was called here personally. Now let me see your supervisor. Go on."

Then two other suited men are closing the door effectively blocking out the sound of Lestrade's voice and Lestrade's view of the situation. John chances a look at Sherlock.

"MI5, " he mimes, as though just the mentioning of them could infect him with their stupidity and utter boringness.

John is still working on the absurdity of the situation. The locum doctor is sewing the wound shut with effortless sutures. One of the two men that closed the door is searching their attacker's clothes, the other has gone into the hallway. John's hands are still gloved and covered in blood, which is drying and cracking, like the blood on his face has already done.

He takes off his gloves and moves to the sink. Meticulously, he washes his hands and then uses one of Mrs. Hudson cloths to clean his face. John guiltily wets it, knowing it will upset her for days. He gingerly touches the wet cloth to his nose and winces.

"Let me." Sherlock has moved beside him, without him noticing and is holding out his hand to take over the cloth.

John pushes his hand away and tries again himself. His nose seemed to have grown twice in size, because he touches it before expecting it and it hurts like hell.

"John…" Sherlock says, using a perfect imitation of John's voice when he thinks Sherlock is acting like a petulant child.

John hands over the cloth and Sherlock starts cleaning. He has to rinse out the cloth six or seven times.

"You should perhaps have Mycroft's pet-butcher take a look at it, but is doesn't look broken."

John sniggers, because well, butchers in bespoke suits, performing secret trauma surgery, while wearing a leash held by Mycroft, just makes you do that. And then he winces, because snorting his nose hurts like hell.

The suited man looks at them. "Please, " and he gestures for them to go upstairs.

They carefully avoid the bloodied tiles and obey. Upstairs, Mrs. Hudson is on the sofa with puffy eyes and holding a cup with two hands and Mycroft is sitting in John's chair, looking thoroughly displeased with the mess that is their sitting room.

"Do you really insist on being taken care of all the time, Sherlock?" he sighs.

Sherlock scowls.


	11. Chapter 11

John fidgets a bit in the middle of his ravaged sitting room. Sherlock, still barefoot, seems determined to keep his position by the doorway ready to show Mycroft out, who crosses his legs in response. John decides on settling down next to Mrs. Hudson.

"Are you alright?"

She nods. "I'd quite like to lie down for a bit though."

John looks at Mycroft, who shakes his head.

"I think they are still busy downstairs, but perhaps you could have a lie-down in my room?"

She nods gratefully, but John catches Sherlock raising his eyebrows.

"Or Sherlock's, it's closer."

Mrs Hudson willingly lets herself be pushed to the bedroom.

"Can I get you anything?" he asks, after settling her on the bed. His eye is caught by the early 1800s three-bladed bleeding knife and a tooth extractor set predating it, still lying on the floor from his earlier anger attack. Not more than two hours can have passed since then. Mrs. Hudson follows his gaze, and for a moment they sit in silence.

"No, thank you dear, I'm just going to close my eyes now. Wake me, when you need me, won't you?"

John gets up, but she catches his wrist.

"Are you alright dear? I mean with Sherlock…" she trails off, apparently unsure of his ability to deal with this. John isn't sure of that ability either, so he resorts to nodding, and rapidly makes his escape.

Neither Mycroft nor Sherlock have moved from their positions, but both look up when John re-enters.

"Tea?" he sighs, and knowing no response will be forthcoming, he sets out to make some anyway.

When he sets down three cups and a full pot on top of four weeks worth of newspapers, he has had it with the war of silence.

"Sherlock, for the love of God, please sit down," he snaps, and then carefully pours a cup for him and holds it out.

Sherlock, surprisingly, listens. He sits down in the free chair and softly hisses. John and Mycroft both turn their heads to him. Sherlock has already smoothed over his face, but Mycroft's eyes have changed to a typically Holmesian sharpness, combining the hiss and the bare feet and John's blush in immediate, precise, deadly accuracy. And a definite note of shock. John's blush intensifies and so does Sherlock's mask of imperviousness.

"I see, my dear brother, you are still taking your social cues from Greek tragedies. Rather ostentatious, don't you agree John?" Mycroft turns his calculating gaze onto him.

John feels like he is running when the ground is already gone beneath him. He looks at Sherlock to get some hold on what is going on, like Sherlock can hook him back into reality, but his face has turned so hard it only confuses John more.

"What...?" he starts, but something about Sherlock's expression makes him stop.

Mycroft is back to acting like nothing is out of the ordinary. "I will be taking my leave, the situation is being dealt with, but I will advice both of you to listen to any orders given. Trust me when I say it is all for the best." He gets up and collects his coat from the armrest.

"We don't need your babysitting, Mycroft, " Sherlock says.

"On the contrary, I think iyou/i require babysitting even more than I had initially anticipated, " Mycroft answers.

He walks to the door and John automatically gets up to let him out. Right before stepping out Mycroft turns to him.

"John…" he says and his tone doesn't have the evenness and disdain that John is used to.

But John has had enough of Mycroft's meddling and their war of silence and of words. So he replies "Mycroft…" with a face clearly telling him to bugger off. Mycroft hesitates but then seems to accept his defeat. John watches him descend the stairs where one of his suited underlings is stiffly waiting to open the front door for him. Without turning Mycroft raises his voice loud enough for John to hear it.

"It has been set in motion?"

His underling says "Affirmative, sir", and then Mycroft is gone.

John knows he can pretend he doesn't know what Mycroft was trying to say, but he has always been too honest a man for self-deception. He turns to Sherlock, who got up and is standing awkwardly in their sitting room.

"Tell me he is wrong."

Sherlock's face does this thing where he's about to lie and then thinks better of it, because he won't get away with it. Seven months, and it's exactly the same facial expression.

"Sherlock, tell me all…" John vaguely waves in the air, "all that that didn't happen as some sort of fucked up apology. Tell me you didn't let me hurt you, no made me hurt you, because you thought you deserved…punishment." John his breathing fastening. He hadn't thought about it. No not it. Sex, sexual encounters with Sherlock. He hadn't thought about it because it was easier not to, not to consider the reasons behind it, and what it made John feel like inside. Which means he hasn't thought about why Sherlock, haughty, distant, seemingly asexual iSherlock/i did what he did.

And John minds goes: touched me, jerked me off, sucked me off, had me inside him.

Sherlock just waits, obviously deciding that is the safest course of action, and it seems to John this is what their dynamic is. He is the eternal black player. White makes a move and all he can do is react as adequately as possible, so as not to lose a tempo, but never able to build up an attack of his own. White is always waiting for him to make a mistake and inevitably lose Sherlock ihappened/i to him - there is no other way of putting it - then and now and he just stands on the sideline and watches. It's not even just Sherlock, it is medicine, the army, girlfriends, London, life putting on a grand show for him and he is just watching, and it's a play he no longer understands.

"Why like that? Just tell me that, " he says softly.

Sherlock stays so very still.

"Why take the last thing you hadn't taken from me?"

Sherlock moves to him, but John can read his intentions in the way his shoulders hunch forwards, strengthening for attack.

"No."

Sherlock is hardly deterred, his hand finding his way to John's hip, pushing against him.

John doesn't move, doesn't react in any kind of physical way, all he does is simply say "Just no, Sherlock, " and he tries to catch his eyes. Sherlock casts them down before spinning away.

"Fine. Just leave then, like you said you would."

John feels like all his moves have been predicted, strategised and stripped of every contingency. There are no unexplored avenues in the battle plan laid against him and it is working; he just feels defeated.

He looks around for his coat, but is has gotten swallowed in the chaos of the day.

"I'm going out, " he says superfluously.

Sherlock just huffs a huff that John thinks is supposed to mean 'see if I care' and positions himself on the sofa with slightly more care than he normally would have taken. John refuses to be drawn out, so he leaves.

At the front door however he is stopped by the suited man.

"I'm afraid I'm under strict orders not to let you leave, sir, " he says with none of the politeness his words imply.

"Bloody hell Mycroft, " John mutters and he kicks the door, knowing full well there is no way he is getting past this man if he was placed here under Mycroft's orders.

He looks around and sees that the kitchen has not only been emptied of doctor and attacker, but also meticulously cleaned in what must have been less than half an hour. He glances upstairs, where he has no interest in returning at the moment. Resigning himself to his new house-arrest, he goes into Mrs. Hudson's now immaculate kitchen and makes himself some tea.

It is quiet in the building, but he can hear at least two more man walking around on the ground floor. Fortunately he is left undisturbed for now. The quiet is both necessary and unwelcome. For months he has lived a life so still he didn't hear how muted it was, but now…his body is so tired, he is coming down from multiple adrenaline spikes, which are being replaced by a dull headache, but he can still feel all the muscles in his body tensing, he can hear the creaking of the floor caused by the men in the room next door, he hears the thud of the water pipes when water starts being pushed through them, he can smell the vapours of dinner being cooked next door, and he knows this well, this feeling, when you run on cortisol continuously, never coming down, but always on the edge, ready for whatever may come, waiting in readiness.

He gets up to make another cup of tea, hoping it will dull the pain in his head and his nose and trick his body into letting go. His mind is frantically replaying little snippets of conversation, images of touching alternated by images of blood, and he knows there is no way in hell he will be able to sleep tonight.

It reminds him of the missions, not at all as action packed as everyone seems to imagine. It was the endless waiting that drove men out of their minds, made them thirsty for blood, for anything really to disrupt the tensed anticipation that can truly exhaust a man.

Those long boring hours in the desert only bring him to Sherlock shooting walls, shooting dead pigs, shooting cocaine, shooting John in the heart every single time.

John forces his thoughts away to tea and kitchen and normalcy, but normalcy for him is only another form of waiting, where any moment he can be called upon when things start going to hell for others, and he will fix them up again, because that is what they ask and that is what he does.

Now he is sitting here in the kitchen when he told Sherlock he was going out, was tricked into saying he would leave, and that is what he should do. He knows this isn't healthy, but he doesn't know if it is his own voice saying it or his doctor's, his therapist's, his sister's, the other's voice that runs his life. All he knows now is that he is tired of following his life around.

And finally he knows that if there's one person that will always push, that will always demand him to follow unquestioning, it is Sherlock Holmes. So he makes a decision. John Watson gets up.


	12. Chapter 12

They stand opposite each other in the war zone of their sitting room. Sherlock has wet hair from the shower and is about to make some sort of snippy remark about John's continued presence at 221B.

"Don't, " he says and it effectively cuts Sherlock off.

John's heart is beating very fast, his breath high in his throat, and he has the strange feeling extremities get when adrenaline is coursing through them. Yes, he is scared, terrified really, because this was never ever part of his plans, but no, it is not the fear that pushes you to run. Rather it is the high of knowing you are going to, come what may. Not because there is no other option, quite the opposite, it is the high of doing it because you chose to in the face of so many alternatives. It is the fear of the unknown in the attack, the sheer risk of it, the type of fear that makes you grin because it will not stop you, it will only make it better. It is terrifying. It is exhilarating.

He walks up to Sherlock, so that he stands behind him, mere inches of space between them. He can see the shoulders in front of him rise as the muscles tense.

"I had never been with a man before, had never even considered it really, " he says softly.

The shoulders rise the slightest bit more, and he hears the intake of breath that precedes objections.

"Shh, " he adds. And very slowly he reaches out his hand and with one finger he slowly strokes the exposed back of Sherlock's neck, from where the hair becomes sparse and has already dried to right below where his seventh cervical vertebra protrudes.

The shiver he feels under his index finger makes his stomach rise and fall.

"I needed some time, you know, and you never give time, do you? " he continues conversationally, while he finger strokes back up Sherlock's neck, to the hollow where his skull and vertebrae meet and his hair is still damp.

"You come here and you just iare/i so much that I don't know where my thoughts begin anymore." His finger is circling in that hollow, twisting around a stand of hair, so he can softly pull it. Ever so subtly, Sherlock lets his head be moved backwards by the pull of John's finger.

"I'm not as fast as you, you know that, so it took me a while to figure it out." John moves his other hand up and traces with the tip of his finger the contours of Sherlock from stubbled chin, over bobbing Adam's apple, to the hollow between his collar bones.

He can feel Sherlock swallowing repeatedly, before he is able to coarsely say "What?"

John moves the tiniest bit closer. They still don't touch anywhere except for the tips of John's fingers, but Sherlock is now close enough to feel warm breath on his skin when John shushes him again.

"You want to know what I figured out?"

Sherlock tries to nod and the strand of hair pulls on John's finger.

"I figured out you were dead wrong, " he exhales against Sherlock's neck.

John lets his arms fall and Sherlock turns to him so fast John feels the air brushing against his face. They are standing very close and he notices Sherlock taking a small step backwards. He has his expression of condescension barely masking the uncertainty below it. It makes John want to reach out his hand and stroke it.

He doesn't. He holds Sherlock's eye showing only the certainty he feels himself in ignoring his nervousness. Then he steps to the side and goes to Sherlock's bedroom.

Mrs. Hudson is sleeping peacefully, looking very small and old. He doesn't quite have the heart to wake her just yet. He watches her chest rise and fall and his own breath tries following the pattern. It calms him somewhat.

A ringing sound is growing louder somewhere in the background. It takes some seconds for John to realise it is his phone in his coat pocket that is making the noise. When he suddenly hears it getting louder, he knows Sherlock has been unable to contain his curiosity and is checking who is ringing. Sure enough, he hears Sherlock clearing his throat behind him. Sherlock is holding out his mobile with his nose wrinkled in distaste.

"It's Lestrade, " he says, like tediousness can be transmitted through aerial signals.

John takes his mobile into the sitting room to ring him back, but of course Sherlock actually answered it, without bothering to say anything.

"Greg? Are you there?"

"John? Is that you?"

John doesn't get the chance to answer in the affirmative.

"What the bloody hell is going on? I get a phone call from your housekeeper about break-ins and attacks and if I can come right away, which I bloody do, even though I am in no way designated first responder, only to find some blokes that I can only guess are secret service blocking my access."

"Greg..."

"No. I am not bloody finished, John. Because then I go to the office to sort out the mess that a fight over jurisdiction is going to be and I find two more blokes waiting there for me. They escorted me home John, where I am right now and they are watching me like hawks, saying it is for my own good and they can't tell me anything just yet. And God knows this has something to do with you and what is going on at Baker Street. I'll stick my bloody hand in the fire that Sherlock's brother is behind this. And right now, I lost my fucking case, and I'm stuck in my house with two buffoons that look very disapproving when I try and get a new beer from the fridge, and I'm being kept totally in the dark about why I need their bloody protection anyway. And I know it has something to do with you, so just tell me what the fuck is going on."

"MI5 is protecting you?"

"Yes bloody MI5 is protecting me. Now I want to know why."

"I'm sorry Greg that you're getting mixed up in all of this. It's all a bit complicated."

Suddenly John knows he doesn't want to share the knowledge that Sherlock is alive with anyone. It is too fragile and he wants it to be his, and his knowledge alone. He is just about to brush Lestrade off when the line goes dead. He stupidly blinks at his phone a few times and tries redialing before he notices there is no service whatsoever, barring one message.

-This will be dealt with John MH-

"Bloody Mycroft, " he sputters and tosses the phone on the sofa.

"What did you expect?" Sherlock seems to have gotten both his composure and arrogance back.

He is checking his own phone, and apparently sees something of interest, because it takes him an awfully long time to read it.

John moves next to him and leans in very close to read what he is so absorbed in. Sherlock seems to want to step away and then think better of it. John puts his hand on Sherlock's arm, who pushes his phone into John's face.

"His name is Uday Al-Zahawi. He was head of Directorate 4 of the Mukhabarat in Basra, " he says tightly.

It makes John smile.

"You have no idea what that means, do you?"

"I don't concern myself with petty politics John. If I ever needed to know the internet could tell me." He looks even more disconcerted.

"But?"

"Mycroft has blocked my 3G access." He is full-on scowling now. John tightens his grip on Sherlock's arm and he can see the uncertainty lying deeper in his expression again.

"The Mukhabarat was the Iraqi Intelligence Service and Saddam Hussein's main power tool. Directorate 4 was its secret service. I would assume a lot of people have been looking for this Al-Zahawi."

"And he turns up in Mrs. Hudson's kitchen."

John can see Sherlock retreating into his head and is surprised the rejection he expected to feel isn't there. He lets go of Sherlock's arm, but lets his finger drag over the fabric, rather then just letting go immediately.

Sherlock turns his head to look at John, when his fingers have left him.

"What was I wrong about?"

John can't help the smile in the face of Sherlock's confusion.

"I think it's alright for Mrs. Hudson to go down again, " he tells Sherlock and keeps his gaze as steady as he can. But Sherlock's intent look of trying to figure something out is now aimed at him and it is making his heart thumb in his throat again. He breaks the tension by raising his eyebrows to make it clear he expects Sherlock to deal with Mrs. Hudson.

Sherlock takes the offered escape and disappears into his bedroom. John releases a breath that his heart had trapped in his throat and sits down. He suddenly feels very lonely without Sherlock next to him in a way that is disconcertingly similar to the pressing loneliness he felt sitting in this same chair those first days with every thought concluding in 'he jumped'. The feeling of loneliness demotes stroking Sherlock's neck to a distant memory of temporary reprieve, administered by a different John.

Sherlock comes out half-carrying a sleepy Mrs. Hudson, who smiles warmly and worriedly at him. He sees the two of them together and knows he is choosing which John he is and wants to be. He smiles back warmly, feeling it reach his eyes. Sherlock looks even more confused than before.

He hears them stumbling down, followed by some people talking and then at long last one set of footsteps coming back up the stairs.

Sherlock indecisively stand in the doorway and it doesn't suit him.

"John.."

"Sherlock, shut up and stay still."

John gets up and Sherlock looks so lost and so desperately trying to hide it.

"And why would I do that?" he asks with as much disdain as he can muster, which is still an impressing amount.

John is very close to him now.

"Because you want to, " he tells Sherlock softly and closes the door behind him.

"Don't be absurd John, " but there is a beautiful crack in his voice that John finds forcefully arousing and he stays very still.

John just looks at him, standing, with their bodies almost touching and he can hear Sherlock's breathing speeding up. With his right hand he slowly strokes down Sherlock's arm from his shoulder to his fingers. He can see the instant Sherlock's eyes change from uncertainty to resolve. His mouth crashes down on John's and his tongue tries to find his way inside, but John doesn't let it, doesn't respond at all, expect for very softly pushing Sherlock away. Sherlock stops trying to kiss him, but doesn't move away.

"We are going to do this my way, " he whispers against Sherlock's lips and very softly strokes back up Sherlock's arm. He can feel him tensing under his touch and when John's fingers reach his neck, he tries to pull away. John grabs his wrist to prevent that, but stops his other touches.

"I don't.." Sherlock starts, but John shushes him again.

"You want to know how wrong you were?"

Sherlock almost manages an eye-roll. John tightens his grip on his fist.

"You thought you could redeem yourself through this, because you seem to assume it is something I want and something you don't want to give."

He slowly loosens his grip again. Sherlock is uncharacteristically just listening.

"You think you don't want to give it because it terrifies you and it hurt you."

He has now let go of Sherlock's wrist completely and instead is covering Sherlock's hand with his.

"So I realised two things. First I realised that if sex terrifies you and you choose it anyway, there must be something else that terrifies you more. And I know what that is."

He inserts his fingers between Sherlock's, intertwining them.

"And second. You do want it."

Sherlock's breathing is heavy and loud and then stops and his body is tensing, but not pulling away.

John make his voice low and breathy.

"I'm going to take you to bed."


	13. Chapter 13

Sherlock shakily exhales. John pulls him by the hand he is holding, interlocking a few fingers, and guides him upstairs to his bedroom. It is still in a state of dishevel from before, Sherlock's shoes in opposing corners, the cabinet crooked and he can feel Sherlock's fingers tightening.

He turns around to face him and slowly pushes him to sit on the bed. His eyes are so very wide and scared, but with relief John can see a clear sign of arousal. His own body can't seem to decide between fear and arousal either, but every time he touches skin it helps him focus. Fleetingly he realises he has no clear idea about the logistics of things, a thing that has been very natural to him for years now, but looking at Sherlock sitting there, body and mind present, pushes his self-doubt away very effectively.

Very slowly he moves to straddle Sherlock on the bed, denim touching wool. He puts his fingers on Sherlock's face, feeling how rough the hairs are, so different on someone else's body. Softly he strokes behind Sherlock's ear and lets his other hand drag along the nape of his neck, his fingers curling into his hair. Sherlock's eyes fall shut, but his breathing becomes even less even.

Carefully he pulls back Sherlock's head by his hair, so he can breathe against the exposed throat and then taste it. Sherlock releases a small grunt. In response John starts kissing his way up Sherlock's throat, past his earlobe and towards his mouth. Sherlock tries to move to meet John's lips, but John is still holding his hair and won't let him. He holds his lips still against Sherlock's, whose mouth has fallen open as a heavy breath escapes it.

"I want to hear you say it." His lips brush Sherlock's as they move.

"Ngh" is the only response John gets, and Sherlock is trying very hard to suck John's lip between his own, so he pulls Sherlock's hair a bit harder.

"Tell me."

His free hand starts to clumsily unbutton Sherlock's shirt and the whimper that this gets out of him goes straight to John's cock. He involuntarily pushes his hips forward, which evokes another moan from Sherlock. John pulls back to put some distance between them and Sherlock's hips try to follow him.

"I.."

"Yes, Sherlock, " John says, and he catches Sherlock's eyes. They narrow dangerously.

"I want you to fuck me, John."

And now it is John who can only moan at the articulate way Sherlock said that. But his moan is in Sherlock's mouth and so is his tongue, pushing inside and swirling around Sherlock's, who in turn is trying to suck John's bottom lip and is sloppy and wet and burning on his skin and so very hot.

John has different ideas though. He wants to feel Sherlock's skin everywhere, because it is warm and is fast becoming sweaty and it is so very alive, and he wants Sherlock's smell in his nostrils with every breath, because it makes the touching more acute and he wants to feel Sherlock everywhere, hear him everywhere, taste him everywhere. He wants all his senses filled with Sherlock to the point that there is no place for anything else, especially no thoughts about not-Sherlock. He lets go of his hair and pushes him back on the bed so he can use the availability of both hands to quickly undo the rest of the buttons.

Sherlock looks overwhelmed, yet seems to be cataloguing how there is someone on top of him taking off his clothes and John knows from how he looks that this is all brand new to him. The guilt of how he fucked Sherlock earlier, with just anger and lust in a dangerous mixture, floods over him, and instead of pushing it away he decides to relish in it, in his responsibility for it, because he is now the one making a move, having been placed in zugzwang. He chose the way of attack, in touching this man's bare chest, with all the lust he possesses.

When John is done with the shirt, he moves to the belt and the trousers, while kissing the exposed nipples. He tries pushing the trousers down, but gets no cooperation from Sherlock. He stops and sees Sherlock wide-eyed and just lying there and he realises he hasn't actually itouched/i Sherlock before, only let himself be touched, only responded. He sits up and very slowly takes off his own jumper and shirt and vest. Sherlock's hands rise a little, but drop back on the bed, like he doesn't know where to put them. So John returns to Sherlock's face and cups it with both hands and very tenderly kisses him.

"I'm not going to fuck you, Sherlock," he says. There are indeterminate emotions on Sherlock's face and at the same time the immediate and crude arousal surging through the body below John at the use of the word fuck.

"I'm going to sit on top of you and have you inside me. I am going to make you come inside me."

In response John can feel Sherlock hips bucking against his arse. He grinds against Sherlock's cock in response and then decides there are still too many layers of fabric between him and Sherlock's bare skin. He gets off of the bed to undo his trousers, and Sherlock pushes himself half-up at the loss of contact and context for his arousal.

"Lie down, " John commands him, and Sherlock obliges. He pushes down his jeans and it is strange how he feels on display, when it is certainly not the first time Sherlock has seen him naked and hard, and he is normally not prone to shyness in the bedroom.

Naked he rummages through his drawers, looking for some old jar of vaseline he knows is in there somewhere. When he looks back to the bed, Sherlock is just lying there, half undressed, not even trying to compose himself.

"Touch yourself, " John tells him and despite his obvious hesitation, Sherlock puts his hand inside his pants and softly strokes himself. John feels himself jerking in response and judging by Sherlock's faster stroke and moan he has noticed too. With half an eye on Sherlock he finally locates the vaseline and returns to the bed.

"Do you touch yourself?" he asks and he takes it as sign of the extent of Sherlock's arousal that he doesn't sigh 'obviously'.

"When circumstances require it, " he answers instead with a clipped tone and John realises with a shock that it is embarrassment that is causing Sherlock's cheeks to flush. He climbs back on top of Sherlock and very slowly drags his hand up his own shaft.

"I like it, " he says.

Sherlock moans in response and but doesn't speed up his touch. John still wants to see and feel all of him, so he lets go of himself and once more tries pushing down Sherlock's trousers. This time he does get help and Sherlock pushes his trousers and pants off his legs. John leans down to kiss him again, hot and slow, and pushes Sherlock's shirt off his shoulders and wrestles it off his arms a bit awkwardly. Their cocks are touching and he can't help rubbing them against each other.

He wraps his hand around both, like it is the most natural thing in the world for him to do and bloody hell, it is at the moment the hottest thing he has ever seen, theirs cocks sliding between his hand, the feeling of something warm and pulsating that responds so well to touches so familiar to him. They are both groaning in unison now and John has to snap himself out of his mesmerisation to not finish it right then. But he wants Sherlock everywhere and mostly he want to give Sherlock that feeling of being iin/i someone, of getting pleasure because of someone else's body against yours, around yours.

He fumbles for the vaseline he dropped on the bed somewhere and with difficulty opens it with his right hand. Sherlock is not even noticing John's clumsiness, he still seems completely enamoured by the sight of them both being touched by John. Only when John stops to put lubricant on his hand, he raises his head to look him in the eyes.

John continues scooping vaseline out of the jar unfazed by Sherlock's changed attention, and then strokes them both very slowly with a sticky hand of melting jelly.

"You will be inside me, " he says.

Sherlock diverts his eyes and flushes again and John feels Sherlock's cock jerk in his hand.

"You want to be inside of me."

The same response, and Sherlock is still refusing to look at him.

"Touch us, " he commands, and he takes Sherlock's hand and folds it around them both, moving his own hand over it to set a rhythm. He lets go and leans over to catch Sherlock's mouth and kisses him aggressively. When he stops, Sherlock is looking at him again.

Without breaking eye contact he moves his hand behind himself and pushes a finger inside. He purposely exaggerates his moan. Sherlock's eyes widen and a very small smile appears on his face, because he knows John is faking it. It seems the first real contact with the Sherlock he is so intimately familiar with. He pushes in a second finger and it burns, because it's been a long time, years it must be, since his girlfriend did this.

"Ngh."

And this grunt is real and Sherlock knows, of course he does, and John feel his touch speeding up between them, on them. On his thigh he feels the tentative touch of Sherlock's other hand, before it drops again. John picks it up and places it high on his thigh, holding it in place, and then pushes a third finger inside himself. His head falls on Sherlock's chest and the sparse hairs tickle him, while he moans against the skin. Sherlock's rhythm is failing, faster and then slower, before fading out altogether.

John pulls his fingers out of himself and pushes Sherlock's hand away from in between them. He scoops up more vaseline and touches only Sherlock's cock this time, still holding Sherlock's hand firmly on his thigh. When the jelly has melted, he repositions himself upright and a bit more forward. He can hear very clearly how Sherlock's breath hitches in his throat.

He takes Sherlock and places him against his arsehole. He doesn't hear Sherlock breathe.

He lowers himself on Sherlock and it burns and fill his whole body with thoughts of too much. He pushes down further and the burn becomes pain. He is on the verge of pulling off again when he catches Sherlock's face. His eyes are scrunched up and he has a look of pure concentration, and there is also pain there, pain John himself knows so well and he pushes down further, the physical pain infiltrating his thoughts and his body and his senses and suddenly he understands the beauty of that pain, how cleansing it can be, because fuck he is alive, like he hasn't been for months, for years before even. And he can make it more.

He pushes Sherlock completely in, and groans because of the sharp shooting pain and then the even stronger shoot of arousal when he hears Sherlock exhaling with so much arousal contained in one breath it threatens to undo him. The pain subsides and he moves up and down again, chasing it, and the pleasure it brings, because Sherlock is in him and is enjoying it.

He wants to speak, but no words are available. So instead he rests his head on Sherlock's, foreheads touching. He sets up a rhythm, which is very slow pulling up and out and very slow going down, until that last bit, when he pushes down sharply and they are grunting in unison. His grunt is sharp and loud, Sherlock's muffled and low, through lips pressed tightly. He lets go of Sherlock's hand to touch his face and open that mouth, pushing his finger inside and kissing around it. The grunts immediately become more audible, but he feels Sherlock's hand slipping of his thigh, so he picks it up again, interlocking their fingers and pushes it above Sherlock's head against the mattress.

He does the same with his other hand, still sticky from before, and now Sherlock is lying stretched out below him, arms locked above his head. John licks his mouth open, which had pressed shut again, and groans into it. A loud groan escapes Sherlock, and John just says "yes, yes, yes" and Sherlock is more vocal after that.

The pain of penetration has changed to the wonderful feeling of filthy fullness and every breath is filled with Sherlock's sweaty scent, mixed with his own, which smells fantastically dirty. John changes the angle and suddenly Sherlock is hitting his prostrate. He pushes Sherlock's hand further into the mattress and starts fucking himself on Sherlock in earnest. He can feel Sherlock tightening and relaxing below him, obviously close and not knowing how to get there.

"You are going to come inside me." He is talking without inhibition and only vaguely realising it. He is getting very close himself and isn't even being touched. But Sherlock seems to like it because he pushes his hips off the bed and into John. Hard.

"I want to be the one that makes you come. I want to feel it inside me. I want to come with you coming in me."

And now it is Sherlock setting the pace. His hands are still locked in place by John, so he can only moves his hips up and down, while John braces himself just above him. John can feel his thighs starting to burn and that discomfort makes it even better. Sherlock is moving in and out of him so fast and it's getting erratic. He leans down and Sherlock seems to think he wants to kiss him, but John moves to his ear.

"When you come, I'll let you go. You can touch me. Make me come all over you. But first I want you to come in me. Give it to me, " he breathes into Sherlock's ear and then he takes the rough skin of Sherlock's neck between his teeth and sucks on it hard.

Sherlock hisses and moans at the same time, and John can feel his body tensing up, and then Sherlock is coming through clenched teeth and inside John, whose brain is buzzing with too much arousal and sense input, from the foreign feeling. He is try to rub himself against Sherlock's belly, while he feels the pulses inside him, but there is no friction, and he forgets his promise to let Sherlock go, because all his attention is focused on Sherlock shooting inside him.

Before he knows it, Sherlock is flipping him over, slipping out of him and crawling down his body to suck him into his mouth. Sherlock moves his head up and down only twice, before John is coming into his mouth, bucking his hips up to meet Sherlock, who takes it all in.

When his orgasm subsides, he feels Sherlock has collapsed half on top of him, his head of John's belly. He tries hoisting him up by the armpits to kiss him, but Sherlock refuses and John doesn't have the strength to pull harder. Instead he puts his hand in Sherlock's hair and lets it rest there.

They stay like that for some minutes, longer than is strictly comfortable, but it seems like a precarious balance of afterglow and prelude to something else and those, John feels, should be respected.

Finally John opens his mouth to say something. His voice croaks.

"Hey…" He moves his thumb through Sherlock's hair.

But he can already feel Sherlock tensing.

"Hey, " he tries again, this time his voice more even.

But Sherlock is sitting up, John's hand slipping from his hair. John sits up as well.

"That was brilliant, Sherlock, " he tries, but it is only the smallest of smiles of recognition on Sherlock's face and then he is getting up to leave.

John grabs his shoulder.

"Sherlock…"

"John, I…"

He seems to hesitate, but then shrugs John's hand off his shoulder. John lets it fall on the mattress and watches Sherlock looking around for a dressing gown of sorts and then stride out of the room naked, when there isn't one.


	14. Chapter 14

John doesn't get straight up to walk after him, he won't be the one following again. Instead he lies down on his back with eyes open, his body still buzzing with subsiding arousal and orgasms past. He hears the water running and assumes Sherlock is taking his second shower of the day, which makes him smile, though it's a small and slightly sad one. The sound of water is eventually replaced by atonal violin exercises.

It is strange, he thinks, how your body can feel so alive, but your brain needs time to catch up, like it's still remembering those months of numbness. And while he is thinking he knows he is lying, because now it is ihappening/i, and always he has felt alive when it is happening. His body can't be trusted, running on an addictive mix of cortisol and oxytocin, while noradrenaline is jumpstarting his synapses.

He falls asleep off and on, tired from more sex in one day than he's had in the past year, awake from emotions more vivid than any he's had for a very long time. It is very early daybreak, when the brain wins, and sleep doesn't seem like a possibility anymore.

There is a low hum of arousal throughout his body, familiar to mornings twenty years ago, and many unfamiliar muscle aches. Both are very pleasant.

He decides it is definitely his body that cannot be trusted, doesn't know what it wants obviously, or rather it does, a man apparently, without telling the rest of him. He considers this last point for a bit, but has difficulty imagining what is different about the arousal he feels for a man or a woman. The only true difference between now and before is now he is alive and so is Sherlock, before Sherlock was not really and neither was he.

It is unnatural to mourn not just the loss of your friend, but also of your hard-won sanity and then to have half of that thrown back into your life. A death can be closed, like fibrotic tissue, but a mind worn in the ways of habit and dopamine-deficiencies will never regrow.

His therapist asked him to say what he had wanted to say, but how can you talk when all thoughts have been banned from activity and instead just stage a performance of things that could have. And now. Now there is a physicality that is definitely communicative, though he has no clue what it's trying to say, and presumably neither does Sherlock. But the rest won't speak, only actions, running, shooting, fighting, but never words.

He pulls his pants on.

He is no longer sure he needs words anyhow.

Sherlock is lying beautifully noncommittally in the sitting room, somewhere between fully dressed and pyjamas with dressing gown and it occurs to John that he might not be alone in this in-between world of sanity and the insane where living and waiting seem mutually exclusive, but where they can maybe both come together in admiring the brutal beauty of reality, when his parents and the rest of society have instilled in him the knowledge that it is not decent to want that.

"Tea?" he says, and proceeds to make it regardless of the answer. The tiny things he forces out of life, it makes him chuckle.

He feels Sherlock watching him, pattering about in their kitchen, and he can feel the confusion trying to push inside.

"I'm guessing you are even less inclined to be held prisoner here than I am, " he asks like that is his greatest worry at the moment.

"It doesn't make isense/i, " Sherlock replies incongruously, "how could they even suspect I was alive?"

John knows he is not expected to reply but contemplates the question anyway. When he adds the milk to his tea, after forgetting to remove the bag, he has a hunch.

"How attached are you to that Webley-Fosbery Automatic Revolver?"

"John, I appreciate your attempts at input, but it is hardly relevant. No one knew." He stresses the last word. After that it takes only slightly under than a second. "But of course... they suspected…"

"Sentiment, Sherlock, the omnipresent determinant."

He puts a cup of tea in front of Sherlock on the table, who immediately places his feet on either side of it.

"Of course, and you, yes, obviously, but why, and how, who?"

He is really rather striking to watch, John thinks, when he sits down with his tea. He puts down his cup, which is burning his fingers, and milky tea slushes over yesterday's Evening Standard, boasting 'No Boffin in the Coffin' as its headline, with a familiar photo below now half soaked in John's tea. He moves his cup to reveal the sub-headline 'Not So Fake Detective Faked His Death'.

Mycroft, he thinks, knows. Dreading what he'll find, he walks to the window, and sure enough, some very conspicuous journalists and photographers are casually hanging about in the street.

"I guess we're out in the open now, " he mumbles more to himself than to Sherlock.

Unsurprisingly he gets no response, and the pinching feeling of loneliness he became intimately familiar with in the last year is right there, so he abruptly closes the curtains and turns to Sherlock, who looks up.

"I'm sure Mycroft intends it that way. Do you think they will sing my resurrection as joyfully as they did my downfall?" he says.

John smiles, but doesn't kiss Sherlock on the forehead, or put his hand on his shoulder. Instead he returns to his tea. He feels Sherlock's stare on him, before it turns on itself and Sherlock's own thoughts.

Downstairs he can hear Mrs. Hudson talking, presumably to their wardens, offering her brilliant home-made crumpets, and he can just imagine Lestrade grudgingly sharing a beer with his captors. He and Sherlock are alone, like the unseen black hole in the centre of the universe, revolving around them, without realising it. Sherlock wouldn't understand a word.

"Sherlock…"

"I'm thinking John, unless you can provide crucial insights into the situation at hand, which I highly doubt, I suggest you let me."

It a sign of where they are that John doesn't even let himself be paused.

"When I first got deployed, it was to Iraq and I had a girlfriend, Gemma, back home. I missed her horribly in the beginning."

Sherlock gives him a look that clearly says he is not at all interested in John's sordid love life, but stays quiet.

"We would send each other letters, which was a hopeless way of keeping up communications, as they kept missing each other, and we would always end up replying to some previous letter, all the time losing the thread of the conversation. Of course there were emails, but internet was even spottier back then, and this was before Skype and all that."

John notices with some satisfaction that Sherlock has some difficulty keeping up pretences that he is not listening.

"At first, I would fantasise about her every night, thinking what we would do when I was back in England, conversations we would have, stuff like that. But then came practise, and field expeditions and often I became too exhausted to have these thoughts. The letters became far and fewer in between, and I just didn't know what to write. I couldn't tell her what is what like, because even I didn't know. Mostly it was waiting, you know, for something to happen, hoping even, but you don't tell your girlfriend that."

Sherlock has dropped his hands in his lap and his face is turned to John, who acts like he doesn't see the attention focused on him.

"Then I realised I hadn't had fantasies about Gemma for a month, I had hardly spared her a thought, except for the letter I got, that I barely replied to. When I returned, she didn't come to the airport to pick me up. It took me two days to notice that."

They stay quiet for a bit, Sherlock still half-acting like he hasn't heard a word John has said, John waiting, because that is what he became good at.

"Why are you telling ime/i this, John? " Sherlock finally asks like he has given it a great deal of thought and can't for the life of him find a connection between him and John's love life.

John sighs and gets up to check outside again. He can see four men with rather large cameras.

"I missed you, " he says against the window, his breath fogging the glass, "and there wasn't a day I forgot about you. I don't think there can be a day."

He can hear Sherlock swallowing, and for a moment he thinks they will actually isay/i something, but then he hears the shift of posture behind him, knows it will be attack instead.

"I'm not your pining girlfriend, John, nor are we star-crossed lovers or whatever romanticised notion you insist on holding."

He doesn't argue, too tired for it perhaps, but he knows that clenching feeling inside him is very close to disappointment.

Sherlock retreats again when his attack doesn't provoke a response. So they stand there, minutes between them, John's unshielded back turned. Until suddenly Sherlock moves abruptly.

"Where did you say you were deployed the first time?" Sherlock asks in his game voice.

"Iraq, " John answers, because this game between them will never stand in the way of ithe/i game.

"You never said, " Sherlock says accusingly, though John is pretty sure he's mentioned it on more than one occasion. "And Yugoslavia?"

"It doesn't exist anymore, what about it?"

"Were you there?"

"I'm not that old, Sherlock, the Balkan wars were in the early 90s."

"I don't mean you personally obviously, I mean the British army, " Sherlock waves his arms around John, like John's entire battalion is standing behind him. Sometimes he wishes they were. He sighs. He is fully familiar with Sherlock's complete ignorance of all things political.

"Yes, the British army was involved in Yugoslavia as part of the UN forces. Why this sudden interest in Britain's war history? Surely Mycroft can inform you much better than I can."

"Ha. Getting Mycroft started on the topic of Yugoslavia is like him eating the first eclair, there is no coming back from that. You know it was his first 'minor incident'. He would go on and on about it to Mummy, dreadfully boring and so trivial."

"Yes, civil war, how tedious…" John teases, and he has trained Sherlock well, because the sarcasm is caught in the small smile on Sherlock's face, before it gives way to an expression that John knows all too well, as a face of no longer thinking but iplanning/i and suddenly his mind makes the jump, Sherlock's has made 10 minutes earlier.

"You think he is army, " he says.

"Ex-army, obviously, but yes."

Suddenly Sherlock jumps up.

"Come ion/i John, " he orders, like it's supposed to make sense, and he grabs John's arm and pulls him up the stairs into his bedroom. The rough pull on his arm floods him with arousal, which finds its way to his groin when Sherlock shrugs off his dressing gown.

He steps forward to pull Sherlock against him, who bends over at the same time, so their heads bump into each other painfully.

Sherlock's eyes widen for a bit when he realises what John intended, but then he scowls and quickly pulls on the shoes and shirt he left behind in John's space last night.

"Come ion/i, " he repeats while pointing to John's shoes. Then he pushes open the rooftop window and half-launches himself out of it. The sight of Sherlock's arse and legs dangling out of the window makes John laugh out loud for so long, Sherlock sticks his head back in once he has climbed through the tiny window.

"John, these are Mycroft's man and though it pains me to say it, they are usually a tad smarter than the rest of them, so eventually they will figure out this escape route. So icome on/i."

John climbs out the window still chuckling.

"Where are we going?", he asks when both of them are precariously balancing themselves on the rooftop.

"The public library, " Sherlock answer and John adds the 'obviously' in his head.


	15. Chapter 15

The descent down reminds John uncomfortably of the physical fitness he used to possess, and certainly does not make him think of roofs and falling, falling, falling. He is holding on for dear life with two hands on the drainpipe, one foot feeling its way, shimmying down two stories into the overgrown garden between Baker Street and Siddons Lane. Sherlock is moving ahead without regard for John's heart and is precariously balancing on one hand and foot to look around for observers. When suddenly he pushes himself away from the wall, John's hands, wet with sweat, threaten to slip, and his heart is beating so hard in his throat that it is obstructing his breathing.

Of course Sherlock has merely launched himself onto the neighbour's garden shed and is no longer waiting for John, who follows much slower and has to judge by the rustling of the plants the direction which Sherlock has taken. He is just diving under a big bush of rhododendrons, when someone grabs him from behind. His undignified yelp is muffled only by the hand on his mouth.

"Third window left from that balcony. They're watching." John feels the hot breath in his neck. "We'll need to go over the other side."

Sherlock turns them around, a branch sweeping dangerously close to his still sore nose, scratching his cheek. John can feel the bruises and scratches forming all over his body, like visual memories of the life he and Sherlock used to have.

The tight grip around him loosens, while Sherlock is examining escape routes straight through the three-story building blocking the other side of the enclosed gardens, but his hand lingers on John's hip. John covers it with his own, and the alarmed look that Sherlock surreptitiously gives him is hard not to find endearing. Before he knows it, John lifts his hand to stroke his cheek.

Sherlock lets him, with a blank expression of indifference on his face, but he doesn't move, until he does, abruptly. John is pulled into the garden behind the rhododendrons and is thrown a green overall from behind the shed Sherlock landed on.

Sherlock in the mean while is pulling on a blue one, and jumps over the low fence separating them from another garden. John climbs over as well, while Sherlock is already knocking on the window one house down.

An old lady, bent with age and arthritis opens it.

"Hullo Madam, we thought we might use the loo? We're the gardeners over there, you see, but the lady just ran out and me and me mate have to go pretty bad." He points to John, who has the presence of mind to grab a shovel leaning against the fence. Sherlock is smiling his grand smile of seduction and John sheepishly tries to mimic it.

An arthritic hand opens the window a bit further. "Oh, I don't know dear. My son always says it's dangerous in London, shouldn't let anyone in without ID and all, " she looks hesitantly at John and rather more fondly at Sherlock, who is nodding enthusiastically.

"I know, I know. I always tell me missus the same, can't trust no one anymore, can't we John?"

John just shakes his head, impressed speechless by the effortless way Sherlock changed into someone completely different.

"Wouldn't want anything to happen to the little ones, would we? You have grandchildren Madam?"

"Oh yes, fourteen of them, " she says with a croaky voice filled with pride. "But they're all grown up now, rarely visit, they do." She looks one more time from Sherlock to John. "Oh dears, come on in. We can't have you working when nature calls, can we."

Some thirty seconds later her garden door opens and they both get inside. "There is the toilet, dears, " she points, and stays to watch them.

"Ta, Madam, " Sherlock says and he motions John towards the toilet. "Say you wouldn't happen to have any photos of all those grandchildren. Would love to see your family. Always like to see a family happy together, I do. Don't I John?"

"Oh yes, yes, come, I'll show you, " she exclaims happily.

"Wouldn't dream of getting dirt all over your lovely place, Madam, " Sherlock smiles most apologetically.

"Oh of course. Just wait here one minute dear, I'll go get them." She stumbles back into her sitting room and John and Sherlock move at the same time, sprinting out the front door in the opposite direction of 221b.

They stop two streets on in a side alley, both laughing and panting in the same rhythm, all mixed together.

"You reckon, we got out unseen? " John says through painful breaths that make him resolve to pick up his exercise.

Sherlock just grins at him and John resolves into another fit of laughter that makes his chest hurt, and suddenly the tears in his eyes are not just from laughter. He swallows them away.

"So, the library?" he says, with a voice even as ever.

Sherlock points to the building they're leaning against that John only now recognises as Marylebone Library, where he has spend a decent amount of days when reading his old medical textbooks seemed the easiest way of stopping all thoughts.

"I hope you brought your card, " Sherlock grins cheekily at him.

John can't quite return the grin anymore, but it doesn't matter, Sherlock is already on the move again, circling the building to the grand entrance.

John grabs him just in time.

"Sherlock…" He points at their attire with raised eyebrows. The way Sherlock's specific stupidities are endlessly endearing conflict with the other knot of feelings in John's chest.

Acting like he knew all along, Sherlock quickly discards his overall.

The library is one of those spaces that seems to shift in era when Sherlock enters, where suddenly the computers John has used so often seem incongruous. They are also apparently exactly the thing Sherlock is aiming for.

Dutifully John gets into typing position, but after failing to log on fast enough by Sherlock's standards, he is pushed away from the computer and condemned to just watching a series on incomprehensible commands that result in pages coming up that he doubts are part of the normal informative service of a library.

He leans over Sherlock's shoulder. The smell of earth and the scent of Sherlock's sweat, which John vividly remembers smelling when he was sitting on top of Sherlock, Sherlock coming inside him, are mixing in his nose. He puts his hand on Sherlock's shoulder.

"I hope you're not seriously hacking into a government database, using a public computer."

"Harder to track, John. It will buy us some minutes, " Sherlock shrugs. John feels the muscles in the shoulder move. He squeezes it.

"Stop touching me. I can't ithink/i, " Sherlock says brusquely.

John takes his hand off, convincing himself he doesn't care.

"I'm sure Mycroft will have no clue who was responsible when the address traces back to the closest library to Baker Street. Real mystery, that," he responds, not able to keep the sarcasm out of his voice.

"Well then, instead of worrying iif/i they're going to come, help me get us out of here before they do."

In a way the volleying of annoyance between them feels as familiar as anything could. This they know how to do.

"What have you got so far?" John asks.

"About 400 people having done tours in Yugoslavia, Iraq and Afghanistan."

"He would be an excellent marksman, right?"

Sherlock nods.

"Cross-reference it with long-range scores from their sniper training."

Sherlock starts typing immediately.

"Moriarty would want someone capable of organising, so sort by rank. I'm guessing you're looking for at least a lieutenant colonel, probably colonel, judging by the time he has served in the army."

Sherlock obeys, and the feeling of power is close to arousal. A shorter list comes on the screen, still some twenty-odd names.

"That's him." Sherlock jumps up, almost knocking John over. "Colonel Sebastian Moran, current place of residence Conduit Street, London." His face contains barely concealed joy. "He's been right under our noses this whole time."

As far as John can judge there are at least five men on the list who would fit their criteria, but questioning Sherlock has never been part of his repertoire.

Then they're running outside again, under the disapproving stare of the librarian, Sherlock hailing a cab at incredible speed. Vaguely John registers the sirens, normally tuned out as part of the background noise of London, and hopes it's not for them. They tumble into the car, their driver not in the least bit bothered by their impatience, used as he is to endless streams of anonymous passengers demanding to be at their destination ten minutes ago.

"Why Moran?" John asks once they are on their way.

"Apart from the obvious?" Sherlock sighs, but it is a fond sigh. One of fatherly pride in the interest his child is taking. "Moriarty would have liked the symmetry. The man ultimately responsible for killing all those I cared about, following the same career path as you. Too tempting to resist. And a colonel, outranking you, lovely. Even better: Moran wrote an obscure book "The Heavy Game of the Western Himalayas". A hunter with its prey. Brilliant really."

"What is the obvious then?"

"Conduit Street? No one is discharged from the army and then able to afford a place there, " Sherlock says, making it obvious how much he despises Moran for his ability to reside in central London.

"Amazing, " John says and he can feel Sherlock's eyes on him for the shortest while.

They're quiet waiting for the traffic lights on Oxford Street. Sherlock's impatience with the cabbie is radiating everywhere.

"So what's the plan?" John breaks the silence. "We'll just barge in there and politely ask him to stop trying to torture me?"

Sherlock can't hide his grin. "I doubt he'll be amenable."

They're grinning again, together. Two idiots chasing military criminals through the streets of London, without backup or plan, and loving every minute of it. His therapist would have choice words to say. Unhealthy being one of them. And John realises how absolutely liberating it is to not care about healthy or proper, to just follows his instincts about what feels iright/i. The feelings are bubbling over the rim.

"I'm glad to have you back, you mad fucker, " he says fondly and Sherlock doesn't recoil, though he is suddenly more occupied by the last traffic light on Oxford.

Then Sherlock leans forward to talk to the cabbie, who has made an impressive effort to ignore any talk of torture going on in his backseat.

"You can stop on the corner of New Bond Street, " he orders and fumbles to get his wallet out of his back pocket, before tossing it to John.

A minute later, the cab stops, and Sherlock jumps out, leaving John fumbling with the cash. He pushes a twenty quid note in the cabbie's hand, and gets out, fearing Sherlock will be well on his way to a break-in if he doesn't catch up to him soon. True enough, Sherlock has a brisk pace through Conduit Street, and John has to break into a run to catch up with him.

"I was not actually kidding, Sherlock. We can't break in broad daylight. Especially into the house of a man known to want to put nails under my fingernails so he can off you."

Sherlock however continues undisturbed.

"Are you even listening to me? We know who he is, why not tell Mycroft and have the whole cavalry descend on him and it can all be over and done with, and we can go home." He stresses the last word, but his attempts are in vain, because Sherlock does brick wall very well, and all words bounce right off and shatter to the floor. Might as well have been his heart, John supposes.

Abruptly they stop in front of no. 13.

"Tie your shoelaces, " Sherlock whispers, while casually leaning against the front door.

Obediently John bends, while in his peripheral vision he can see Sherlock fumbling a bit under his coat. Just when John straightens himself, Sherlock is gone and the door is left ajar. And even if he had had all the choices in the world, at that moment John would always choose entering that door.


	16. Chapter 16

They are standing in an eerily quiet marble hallway, too big for any London house. John feels like even his breathing is echoing off the walls, alarming anyone and everyone that they are here and they are vulnerable. Sherlock is looking around with rapt interest showing on his face and no trace of concern about getting caught.

John doesn't share this heedlessness and his fingers curl back to the gun in his waistband, while he looks from the ostentatious marble pillars with busts of unknown men on them to the painting of what is presumably Colonel Moran on the wall.

He keeps his fingers on his gun, when they move on into the the drawing room, which is as silent as the hallway was. Sherlock walk around, running his hands over the fireplace, glancing in the baroque mirror hanging above it, his eyes meeting John's. There is a definite smile there, and a vulnerability that is new. The heavy beating in John's chest that had slowed down a bit, picks up again. Sherlock breaks the connection, moving on, touching the piano to play the highest key with a soft ping.

When Sherlock is satisfied they enter the next door down the hallway, and they find themselves in the study. Sherlock examines the beautiful Davenport desk, and John knows he is checking the concealed drawers, but apparently they hold nothing of interest.

The bookcase beside John is filled to the brim with books that look like they have never been read, except for one, which John pulls out. It's Moran's 'Heavy Game of the Western Himalayas' , and judging by how the spine of the book is broken in several places, Moran is a fan of his own work. John flips through it, pictures of shot down animals alternating heroic stories, and shelves it again.

"Shouldn't a man like Moran have a butler, or something?" he asks Sherlock, because he still finds the quiet of the house in the middle of the city disquieting.

Sherlock hardly pauses in his investigation of the space. "Moran is a member of the Garrick club. They have a luncheon every Wednesday." He continues rifling through the papers. "He wouldn't retain personnel without supervision." He drops the papers carelessly back on the desk. "And no one can afford a live-in butler anymore these days." He adds the last bit as though it is a personal insult that society has come to that.

John chuckles, and again Sherlock glances at him, with that smile in his eyes. He doesn't break the gaze this time, and their eyes remain locked, until it is John that clears his throat to point out they should perhaps get on with their breaking-in-business. He knows it's cowardice, but he doesn't want to feel this now, when the chase and Sherlock are sweeping him up in a whirlwind of adrenaline, obfuscating what is real.

They cross the hallway again, this time entering a darker room - the presumably garden windows darkened by drawn curtains - when two gleaming eyes startle John out of his contemplations. He has half-pushed Sherlock behind him with his gun out, before his eyes adjust enough to the darkness to recognise the pair of eyes as belonging to a majestic deer head, mounted on the opposing wall of the dining room.

Sherlock has to scramble back to his feet.

"For God's sake John, we are hardly in danger of being trampled by beheaded game."

It's the accusatory tone that makes John's barely buried annoyance trump his embarrassment.

"What exactly are we in danger of here? I mean, apart from the Met arresting us for burglary and the secret service coming after us for hacking into a government database. Or perhaps one or two foreigners with a professional interest in torture techniques? Maybe you're willing to share, so I can stop standing here looking like a dunce in the eyes of a bloody stag with bloody lopsided antlers and an idiot who threw himself of a rooftop."

John can see when the infuriating man in front of him stops listening to his outburst. Despite knowing a row during your attempt at burglary is a singularly bad idea he know he won't be able to stop himself. His emotions are all over the place and won't let themselves be caged so easily anymore.

Sherlock preempts him though. "You are an absolutely brilliant man. Fantastic. Of course."

John is dumbfounded, as he was just about to have another go at Sherlock, who is now shaking his shoulders in abundant enthusiasm and then plants a wet kiss on his mouth, before bouncing towards the stag.

John knows he should still be angry, and definitely not encourage this type of behaviour, but he is really very curious when Sherlock starts moving a heavy mahogany table off the massive oriental rug below it and pulling the rug aside, while knocking back a few chairs in the process. It makes even less sense when he drops down to his belly and starts running his hands over the floor in what can only be described as a caress.

When Sherlock jumps up again and starts stroking the deer, John is seriously contemplating the notion that they have both finally dropped of the precipice of insanity. Of course that is the exact moment the floor opens up before him.

"What the hell is that?" he asks stupidly, as it is pretty clear the well-hidden trap door in the parquet is a secret entrance straight out of a Famous Five book, with antlers triggering it to top it off.

"That would be a cellar. One I suspect to be connected to a more extensive subterranean network, judging by how carefully it was hidden, " Sherlock states, already climbing down.

John has no choice but to follow.

"Where does it go?" he asks, when he has also descended the well-used metal ladder into the dark space below.

Sherlock doesn't answer, preferring to feel his way around the small cellar presumably for a door of sorts.

"Did you at least bring a torch?" John asks resignedly instead.

Suddenly he feels a hand on his side and Sherlock's whisper in his ear.

"You did, " and then Sherlock's hand creeping into his front pocket. He catches the wrist before it can wriggle free.

"What are we doing, Sherlock?" he demands, turning so that they are facing each other, though he can barely make out Sherlock's eyes despite that their bodies are touching from chest to knees.

"Getting a torch, John," Sherlock says, the rolling of his eyes nearly audible, John's phone in his hand.

"That is not what I mean, and you know it."

Sherlock has the audacity to try and deny it, though they are both hard against each other.

John repeats his questions with his lips so close to Sherlock's he must feel the shift of air when he speaks.

"What are iwe/i doing?" he says slowly, enunciating every word.

He knows he's forcing things, but yesterday he finally made the decision to at least be in charge of his own unhappiness, so there is his hand on Sherlock's hip, pulling it forward against him.

He feels more than hears the heavy sigh escaping from deep inside Sherlock's chest. It enters his body through his mouth straight down to his groin and that is enough confirmation for him, so that it doesn't matter when the body under his hand tenses up, and he has to drop it from the hip. Now is not the time.

Instead he puts his hand on the small of Sherlock's back in an encouraging way.

Sherlock flips through the phone, the blue light making the lines in his face starker. He looks older, more than the intervening months would have warranted and suddenly what John feels is concern for his best friend, who went away because he thought it was necessary. It is a composite feeling of memory and actuality overlaid on each other, but it contains the possibility that things could be what they were.

Could be better.

The sudden beam from the torch in John's phone outlines the small wooden door right in front of them. It creaks when John opens it, his gun in his hand once more, and Sherlock enters, ducking his head, the light of the torch bouncing off shabby brick walls.

John follows into the low tunnel, just able to walk upright. Hollowed out steps form a stone staircase, leading down into utter darkness. Their footsteps are reverberating on the walls in a rhythmless procession

"What are these tunnels? They look ancient, " John asks.

"Not quite. Wartime smuggling tunnels. But if I'm not mistaking...Yes."

Their descend has stopped as they enter under a small arch into a much larger tunnel, that looks to be in a better condition. From what John can see it has arches of at least 12 feet high, build in Victorian style.

"Yes, London Hydraulic Power Company used this as their Westminster maintenance connection, which means it must…"

He speeds up, shining John's phone left and right through the honestly impressive construction.

"Yes, here."

They stop at a small doorway, John surely would have missed if Sherlock hadn't pointed it out.

"You can see the traces of recent usage, of course, " Sherlock tells John in his teaching voice.

"So that means we will now enter…" he ducks through the door and they enter a much narrower tunnel, that looks decidedly more modern. "…the British Telecom system. You know, few people realise the extent and the connections between the subterranean structures of London. Electricity, Underground, the water companies, even the stables over at the Camden catacombs. Personally, I've always found knowledge of the paths that can't be seen quite as useful as knowledge of…"

"Sherlock! Could you please dispense with the lectures and just tell me where we're going. I'm not very keen on meeting Moran down here, I have to say."

Sherlock looks a bit hurt at being interrupted, as far as John can judge it by the set of his shoulders backlighted by his phone and at any rate he doesn't get an answer.

They follow the tunnel in silence for five more minutes, during which it seems to grow lower and narrower, until suddenly Sherlock stops and John bumps up against him, his still painful nose hitting a hard scapula.

"You berk. You could at least tell me when we're…" But Sherlock covers his mouth with a hand, and points up, before switching off the light on John's phone.

There is a circular tunnel going upwards, and the draft probably means it is an exit. Vaguely John can see some light in the distance. Sherlock is already pulling himself up by the bars attached to one side, when John pulls him down again.

"I'm going first."

When Sherlock starts to protest he adds, "which one of us has the military training again?" and that seems a convincing argument enough, though John suspects it has less to do with his ability to quietly enter enemy territory and more with his superior handling of a firearm.

Sherlock gives him an annoying push upwards, and then he is clumsily climbing the bars towards the light, trying to keep his gun from clunking against the metal. It is a good twenty feet up, and it is slow going. He can't hear Sherlock below him, but knows he is following.

When he finally reaches the light it is still dim, but clear enough so he can see the outline of a trapdoor above him. He flicks the safety off his gun and moves as high up as he can, so his back is flat against the hatch. Very slowly he pushes to see if it gives. Immediately the light becomes brighter and he can see Sherlock's anticipatory face beneath him. He lowers it again and darkness falls. Then he braces himself to jump out with enough speed to surprise any possible adversary.


	17. Chapter 17

There isn't one. The trap door flies open, falling back on the floor with a dull thud. John turns his gun left and right, checking every corner and all entrances to the room. There is only one, a door, closed. The windows are blocked with particle boards, giving the room a stuffy, oppressive feel. John waits, standing on the ladder, for someone to respond to the racket, his eyes and gun aimed at the door.

Sherlock however is unsurprisingly not much for proper safety procedure when entering unknown enemy territory. He starts climbing the ladder to get out of the hole and presumably to start investigating already. John is in his way, but he is not deterred, folding his body around John's, hands on either side of his body.

John wants to tell him off for his impatience, but then realises there is nothing in Sherlock's movements that speaks to that. Rather, Sherlock has slowed down and is leisurely pushing his body higher up along John's, seemingly using the fact that John's hands are occupied with holding himself in place and aiming his gun to take control of the rest of John's body, akin to how he abruptly started doing days ago.

John's mind is still on adrenaline, ready to defend, primed for every noise, and at first Sherlock's body is merely a registration. But then the deliberate character of Sherlock's movements becomes too present to relegate. Not for the first time, he marvels at the disparity between action and thought, and body and mind, because his and Sherlock's brains are fighting, have been fighting for days (months) dug in trenches not hundred yards apart, but with a distance that can't be crossed without being shot into shreds, while their bodies…

Sherlock's left hand, placed on the ladder, behind his arse, touching it. Sherlock's right hand, moving up, brushing past John's nipple, before settling on the chipped metal. Sherlock's chin, brushing past his iliac crest, his nose close enough to breath in the bare skin between John's jeans and jumper, Sherlock's leg, placed on the step, so that their lower legs align from foot to knee, body warmth felt through two layers of fabric.

Then moving further up, Sherlock's whole body pressing against his, legs caught between Sherlock's, Sherlock's groin against his hip, his shoulder pushing against Sherlock's chest, forcing Sherlock to hold his arms straight to position himself.

John's thoughts have long shifted from the sounds of footsteps far away to the sound of breathing near to him. His eyes are on Sherlock's arm which is close enough to put his nose against. He turns his head - no sense in pretending - but doesn't drop his gun arm, keenly aware that doing so would put it around Sherlock's neck, hugging him.

They stand like this. Seconds ticking away with their heartbeats.

Then Sherlock ducks under John's arm, so that he is hanging from the ladder right in front of John. They both have one foot on the ladder, and one dangling in the air with uncertainty.

When John finally looks at Sherlock, it is with a face modulated to one of challenge, because this is Sherlock seducing him in the middle of a chase for God's sake and he should see it through.

"There's no one here", Sherlock says and Sherlock hates stating the obvious, so it must not be that right now.

"It seems that way." John is carefully noncommittal, a tried and tested way to provoke an enemy out of his comfort zone.

"I was alone", Sherlock tells him softly, before touching John's lips with his own. Their connection is so very gentle, both their lips dry and pulvinate, the friction of the chaps offset by the give of the flesh. Sherlock holds himself like that until John is sure he can feel his heart pulsating against Sherlock's mouth, but he holds still, discipline part of his personality.

Then Sherlock pulls away, pushing himself out of the hole, not looking at John, but instead at the windows, the dust on the floor, the door.

Three second to compose himself and then John yells after him. "Wait for me, you careless berk, anyone could be waiting for us." Sherlock gives him a strange look, but waits anyway.

John pushes himself up with somewhat less grace than Sherlock managed.

"Keep behind me, I'll check if we're clear", he says, and Sherlock obeys.

He pushes open the door, but behind it there is only more dust-filled air and darkness. They're in the hallway, a barricaded door to the right, presumably the entrance to the house. He motions for Sherlock to follow him up the stairs. It is too dark to be sure, but they look used, the dust layer over them thinner and disturbed. Sherlock declines, motioning to the open door in the back, presumably the kitchen. John sighs with worry, but lets him. The house seems empty enough. He climbs the stairs, each step accompanied by creaking wood.

Upstairs the heat is even more oppressive. The landing seems to lead to four more doors, each cracked open to a varying degree. Around the one farthest away there is a minimum of light, so John decides to continue his investigation there. Downstairs he can hear the comforting rhythm of Sherlock distinctive footsteps, and outside he can hear busses and cars passing by, but other than that it completely silent in the house.

He enters the room, the sound of traffic is louder here, so the room must look out over the street. The light John had seen from the hallway comes from three sets of small holes in the particle boards right on top op each other, the beams shining through them cutting a dusty line to the peeling flowery wallpaper on the other side, which is oddly reminiscent of their own faux-Victorian wallpaper.

John knows enough of Sherlock's methods to tell there have been people here recently, the bare wood of the floor lighter in colour in the centre of the room than on the sides.

He touches the holes, noticing the circular scuff marks around the lower one, which are all too familiar from hideouts near the mountains of the Kandahar region and are always entwined in John's mind with a 22-year-old and a bullet straight through his head, who took 18 long hours to die. The marks had been the only thing found at the hideout, before it was burned to the ground.

It must be the heat and dust making those memories of the war so vivid, though they seem more at the forefront of his thoughts now Sherlock is around again (now we can feel again). So many people he has mourned, only one unnecessary. How do you forgive that?

John stoops down, levelling his eye with one of the holes, squinting against the bright light outside. He closes his eye, a bright orange spot dancing in his field of vision. When he looks again, he can focus on the windows opposite, and with a icy shock, he realises he knows those windows very very well. A cold chill runs over his back as he remembers standing in front of them not two days ago, telling Sherlock's reflection how he has missed him.

"What do you think of my view, Captain Watson?" he hears a gruff voice behind him. Immediately he is back in the war.

He gets up very slowly, viscerally aware of the rifle aimed at his back, before having seen it.

"Colonel Moran", he says with all the contempt he can muster, while his brain is running full speed, mostly focused on his phone still in Sherlock's possession.

"Did you enjoy your house visit, Doctor? I must say the NHS provides us with quite the service these days. "

John turns to face him, waiting. He is not the one Moran is after. If he were, he would be dead. It is a calming and terrifying thought. Those have always gone together quite well for him.

"So tell me Doctor, where is your miraculous patient? It is not every day we get to see a dead man walking."

John doesn't respond, taking his time to seize up his opponent. Moran is a large man tending to obese, gone out of shape after years of exercise. His breath is a little short - he must have been running - and he is sorely overdressed for the weather and the situation. His black moustache looks damp with sweat and the rifle he is aiming at John is clearly a military sniper rifle. He calculates the odds of overpowering Moran before he has a change to rechamber against Moran's experience, unfortunately concluding that this is a man who won't miss his shot.

"Quiet, are we?" Moran motions John into the corner lit with two beams of its own and tosses him a pair of handcuffs. "To the radiator. No funny business."

John follows the instructions, no other options clear. He clicks the handcuffs around the metal, silently testing its give while doing so. The light from outside is hot on his cheek. He can't help but look again, their flat displayed like a puppet theatre before him. In the back he can see two men walking - Mycroft's men - but there is no way to signal them for help.

"Jim told me you were good at following orders, Captain Watson. Good, I like discipline in a man."

John ignores him in favour of the view outside, hoping for some brilliant idea straight out of the mind of Sherlock Holmes. None comes. The men have left their sitting room and it is silent now, like the pause between two acts. He strains his ears to hear the comforting sound of Sherlock's steps, but it seems even quieter now that before, the street sounds strangely dimmed. He refocuses on the facade of his house, the shadow of the empty house they are in cast on his own windows.

Then an all too familiar silhouette appears in front of the window and John's brain goes fuzzy, though he doesn't manage to stop his body from reacting with a violent jerk. Sherlock? How? is all his thoughts amount to.

Moran, of course, notices.

"What is that you spot, Captain? You flinch like a man who spotted a tiger waiting to be shot." Moran grins widely, dropping to his knees five feet away from John, to check through his own set of holes.

John can see the the triumphant set of his shoulders when he spots his quarry. With practised ease, Moran unfolds the tripod for his rifle and sets it up, the sight aligned with the top hole.

Through his own aperture John can see Sherlock still standing there. Violently he pulls on the handcuffs, trying to get his feet far enough to push over the firearm, but he can't reach. Moran gets up and unceremoniously kicks him in the belly. Hard.

John feels the breath knocked out of him and his knees curl to his chest in reflex. It takes some time before he is able to overcome the overpressure in his lungs and inhale again. Moran takes this time to kneel back down and aim. Two slow breaths and the shot is fired, mind-shatteringly loud despite the muffler. Moran's proud huff and John just catches the sight of a curly-haired body falling.

The world crashes faster and louder than John's comprehension. A crashing noise from downstairs. The sound of many feet drumming on the stairs, pushed forward by a "Go, go go" shouted in an imposing voice. Sherlock pushing through the door, putting his arm around Moran's throat and tightening it. His own shout, saying "No Sherlock" though he doesn't know what he is saying no to. Five heavily armed men in suits fill the room, surrounding Moran and Sherlock, pulling Sherlock away from a cyanotic colonel, who slumps to his knees, wheezing.

Sherlock is uncharacteristically fighting the men with little efficiency. John, having found his breath again, though now it is too fast and shallow, sits up with a groan.

"He is fine, Sherlock", he hears Mycroft's voice in the doorway. In response Sherlock places two well-placed jabs with his elbows, eliminating two, while the third man is floored with a elegant throw. He rushes to John.

"You alright? " he asks, and John just nods yes.

"I'd be better if you could get this bloody handcuffs off me", he adds and it sounds breathy, but Sherlock is already leaning over him, fiddling with the locks, his sweaty hands hot on John's arm.

"Ahem."

Sherlock barely looks up from his chore to check John. John just nods his head in the direction of Mycroft, who is looming over them, holding out the keys with an amused smile. Sherlock hesitates very briefly before grabbing them and unlocking John from the pipe he chained himself to. John's other arm is still wound tight around his painful ribcage, so Sherlock takes to rubbing the sore skin of John's wrist, while turning his attention back to Moran. Mycroft has taken a step back, observing the scene before him, his face betraying a mixture of mild surprise and some kind of satisfaction.

Moran is standing upright again between two men more than a head taller, the arms cuffed behind his back not a good look on him. He looks as taken as John feels by what has occurred.

"You. You", is all the manages to say to Sherlock, as Mycroft nods for his subordinates to take him away.

Sherlock, still holding John's wrist, stands up tall as he does, and gives Moran the most fake and proudest smile that John has ever seen him give, and it is so very much Sherlock, that John feels a burst of pride for being there with him, together.

When the door closes, John remembers his confusion and fear.

"What happened?" he asks, but Sherlock cuts him off.

"We are going home", he tells Mycroft and tugs at John to follow him. "You should let Lestrade go, before he turns your minions into his drinking buddies."

John is careful to be sure they are out of Mycroft's sight, before he shrugs off Sherlock.

"What happened?" he asks again and it sounds angry, though he is not sure whether that is intentional or not.

"I'll show you." There is glee on Sherlock's face and it is obvious he is ignoring John's subtext.

The frontdoor has been forced open, and the street has been blocked off. A good number of people (and photographers) are gathered on either side of the red-white plastic that separates John from the normal world. Sherlock runs across the street, and it takes the clicking of shutters and one or two flashes for John to realise he should probably do the same.

The door to 221B is open and not very welcoming, as the suited men seem to have multiplied and mixed with police officers in uniform.

To John's surprise they are met in their sitting room by Sally Donovan, examining a jelly bust on the floor. She looks up at the sound of them entering.

"So it iis/i true", she says when spotting Sherlock. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised, you always struck me as far too much of a narcissistic arse to off himself." John hears the smile hidden in her snarky words.

"If you would just turn that observational skill to your job and your love life, you would do us all a favour", Sherlock replies and John would certainly count that as a compliment if it were directed at him.

Donovan however ignores it and return her attention to the dummy. Sherlock drops down to his knees next to her.

"Got the bullet?"

Donovan nods, rolling over the dummy, pointing to where the bullet is lodged in the ballistic gel. It is perfectly centred, visible through the viscose material right between the eyes. A straight shot to the back of the head. The curly wig is lying a foot away, the dressing gown that had been draped on its shoulders, lying in a puddle on the floor below the windowsill.

Sherlock gets up. "Mrs Hudson!" he booms out.

"Just a minute, Sherlock, I'll be right up."

Sherlock hurries to the door, to catch her climbing the stairs. "You were lucky he chose a headshot Mrs Hudson. You could have used my other gown, this one is dreadfully difficult to replace."

Mrs Hudson enters the room with a disapproving smile.

"You impolite boy! You ask me to crawl on my knees to the window to push this bust into place, and you know how bad my hip gets, and then tell me off for not doing it right. One had hoped being away would have taught you some manners, but we mustn't hope, must we? You are lucky your friend Sally was here to help me do it. I don't know how I would have managed that on my own."

"Oh, but you did well. It worked like a charm, didn't it. He fell right for it. Beautiful." Sherlock is smiling proudly, waiting to be complimented by his audience. Mrs Hudson and even Sally Donovan are looking like they might oblige.

"Everybody out!"

John has just been observing, biding his time, but now the chattering, the action that crashingly came to a halt, the ipeople/i, they overflow him, making the control he felt he had won leak out.

"We need to talk. Now," he tells Sherlock.

Donovan starts to object, hovering protectively over the dummy, but John cuts her off. "Take it with you, or come back later to collect it, I don't care. Just leave now."

She quickly rolls the dummy into a bag with the help of the other uniform in the room. Mrs Hudson ushers the remaining suits down the stairs.

It takes them five minutes to clear the room. Sherlock stands there, his expression frozen between proud glee and frightened insecurity. John just stands.

"You did it again", John says when the quiet has settled.


End file.
